UMass Memorial Health Care opened a new COVID-19 vaccine site at downtown Worcester’s Mercantile Center on Monday in the latest step to dole out as many vaccines as possible.
The center is open, at least at first, only to UMass Memorial patients aged 75 and older, and by appointment only. The Mercantile Center has donated a big empty space for vaccinations and testing, in the same space that has long been used for coronavirus testing.
The vaccination center will operate weekdays from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. for the next few months.
A second large-scale vaccination site is scheduled to open at Worcester State University on Feb. 16. That site will be run at the university’s fitness center by Saint Vincent Hospital and UMass Medical School’s consulting and operations arm Commonwealth Medicine, and be open Tuesday through Saturday. Appointments will be needed.
Statewide, more than 681,000 vaccine doses have been administered as of Feb. 4, according to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. Nearly 900,000 vaccines have been distributed to vaccination facilities, including 105,000 to facilities in Worcester County.
