A space where young people used to go to buy trendy and affordable fashions is now where their grandparents will head to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
Sarasota County’s health department has moved into the former Old Navy store at Sarasota Square Mall and transformed the 13,000-square-foot space into its main vaccine clinic.
The site opens Thursday for appointments to administer the booster shot to people who received their first dose of the vaccine at the end of December.
Officials say the county will be able to vaccinate as many as 1,500 people per day at the site.
But the main selling point, and why the county chose it, is its location.
When Sue Lang’s mother tested positive for COVID-19 this week, it made her worried for her mom’s health, but it also made Lang angry at those coordinating vaccine distribution.
Lang’s 96-year-old mother, Ann, lives at A Banyan Residence, an assisted living facility in Venice. She’s bothered that her mother and many other frail seniors in assisted living have yet to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, even as Florida officials began vaccinating the general population of seniors weeks ago.
A Banyan Residence initially was told it would get the vaccine by the end of December, according to the facility’s administrator. But the company contracted by the federal government to do the vaccinations pushed the date back to Jan. 24, the administrator said, and now it’s not clear if the vaccine will even arrive by then. In the meantime, Lang’s mother has contracted the virus.