We are delighted to announce that the J&J vaccine is now available for seafarers visiting Seattle!
The J&J shot is being offered two afternoons a week (Tuesdays and Thursdays) at Terminal 90 in Seattle (the cruise ship terminal) administered by Discovery Health. Discovery specializes in maritime medicine, so seafarers are who they serve!
With at least a week's notice, Discovery can also provide vaccines onboard ships. Hopefully over the summer, there will be more/some options for onboard vaccinations. For now though, the T90 mobile clinic works well enough as we discovered this week with the first crew from the Saldanha Bay (Pacific Basin).
If onboard vaccinations are the only option, please contact Taylor Pellizzari (tpellizzari@discoveryhealthmd.com) and Bridget DeMouy (bdemouy@discoveryhealthmd.com) directly to find out what is possible.
For crews interested in using the mobile clinic at T90, here's what your captain will need to do:
Ahead of time, register for appointments for the day you anticipate needing vaccines (a Tuesday or Thursday). There is a separate, unique link for each day. You can reach out to me or to Taylor at Discovery for those links. (chapman@mts-seattle.org or tpellizzari@discoveryhealthmd.com).
When you register, please consider registering your crews in groups of 8-10 at a time. Our two vans can comfortably carry 10 people at a time. Plan on travel time from the ship to/from the clinic of about 90 minutes (45 minutes one way) and then 45 minutes for the vaccinations themselves. (Total time commitment of about 2.5 hours.)
As soon as you register, reach out to me (for ships in Seattle) or Paul (for ships in Tacoma) to coordinate transportation. Discovery Health is very flexible, so if you show up a little early or late, they can totally accommodate that. Ideally, we need a couple of days to coordinate transportation, since our Center has only one staff and a couple of key volunteers.
Vaccines are free to seafarers. All seafarers will need is an id with a birthdate. Seafarers will receive the COVID vaccine card once they are done, and that information will also be registered in a database in Washington State in case they lose the card. The Center welcomes donations for transportation, but those are not required, of course.
A Note about Visas: if any member of your crew has an expired US visa, s/he may apply for an emergency medical parole granted through the US Customs and Border Patrol. This will grant the crew member(s) access to US soil long enough to receive a COVID vaccine. Please have your shipping agent work with CPB to make that happen. We can provide transportation to seafarers to pick up their emergency paroles after those have been granted.
This is a developing process, so some of this may change over time. Feel free to reach out with questions and to ask about the links for upcoming berthings in Seattle. We are grateful this is now available for all of you beloved, brave souls!
To learn more about vaccination efforts for seafarers visiting the United States, click NAMMA's website, which lists the most up-to-date information. Click here.
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