Upper Pine River Fire Protection District vaccinated about 120 people Saturday, its first day as a COVID-19 vaccination clinic.
The district, which covers 256 square miles in eastern La Plata County, including the town of Bayfield, recently completed the application and training process required by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to become a clinic. Demand for vaccines is high as Colorado moves through its phrased distribution plan.
“We were off and running,” said Bruce Evans, Upper Pine fire chief, in a news release Sunday. “We vaccinated over 100 people in over 12 hours including the 80-year-old former president of the American Medical Association and a World War II veteran.”
Colorado is in its first phase of distributing doses of the COVID-19 vaccines developed by pharmaceutical companies, Moderna and Pfizer. In clinical trials, the vaccines were shown to be around 95% effective.