KANSAS CITY, Kan. — The COVID-19 pandemic and the state's vaccination plan is still a top priority for Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly.
“I do want to experience what it’s like to come to a testing and a vaccination site like this. I want to see what people are going through. I talk about this, I think about this every single day," Kelly said.
On Thursday, Kelly toured Wyandotte County's COVID-19 testing and vaccination site.
“We also want to engage the governor and her staff in more conversations about how we can assist in ramping up the distribution of the vaccine, and not just in Wyandotte County but in fact in the eastern part of Kansas," Kansas City, Kansas Mayor David Alvey said.
Currently, more than 3,500 people have been vaccinated at the facility located on State Avenue in Kansas City, Kansas.
“We can vaccinate many, many, more of that as soon as we have that vaccine available to us," Juliann Van Liew, Public Health Director for the Unified Government of Wyandotte County, said.
After touring the site, Kelly said she'd like to see similar facilities throughout the state to help with mass vaccinations.
“We’ve got to have facilities like this set up to be able to hand vaccinations in large quantities," Kelly said.
Wyandotte County plans to open two additional sites by Mar. 1. One in the eastern and western part of the county.
“Both of them look similar to this and my ultimate hope is by the first of March, we’re running 7 days a week, availability 12 hours a day during the week days to get people vaccinated in this pandemic," Bob Bennett, Unified Government COVID-19 Vaccine Operations Director said.
