You might think it would be absurd to claim that millions of hours of Illinoisans’ time has been wasted on the state’s dysfunctional system for making an appointment to get a COVID vaccine.
But the numbers are straightforward and it could easily be as much as ten million hours.
Those who are most frustrated are undoubtedly those who most need the shot – the old and sick who have little if any computer skills and no family support.
That system – as anybody knows who has tried it – is nothing more than a hunt-and-peck game that usually produces nothing. Go through any of the many Illinois online systems for making an appointment and you end up with nothing, unless you are among a random few who chance upon an opening.
The real problem is there’s no means to request a notification of any kind when appointments do become available, so going back time and time again to multiple sites is the only option. Nothing has changed since we described it last week.
About 4.1 million Illinoisans are now eligible to make an appointment to be vaccinated. Illinois now is in Phase 1B for those 65 and older plus certain essential workers. About one million vaccines have been administered which means about 3.1 million Illinoisans are unvaccinated and probably have been trying to set up an appointment.
If you assume those 3.1 million people have wasted a little over three hours on average trying to make a reservation, that’s 10 million hours wasted. Maybe they’ve only wasted one hour on average. That’s still 3.1 million hours. But if you’ve been trying the system, as we have been at Wirepoints, it’s easy to waste over three hours and still get nothing.
Whatever. One million hours. Three million. Ten million. It doesn’t matter. This is inexcusable.
Sometimes it’s as if the health authorities are deliberately trying to annoy the crap out of you by wasting more of your time.
For example, at 3:52 pm Sunday, Cook County texted out a message saying, “We are pleased to announce that Cook County Health has released additional availability of vaccine appointments to Phase 1A and 1B residents of Cook County.” I checked immediately but, as always, nothing was available. At 6pm they sent another text saying nothing was available. Thanks for nothing.
They might as well send another saying, “Suckerrrrrr.”
A recent Tweet described perfectly how this is going:
He’s right. This is not a system. It’s a fiasco.
-Mark Glennon
Audio and summary 
If this bill passes, say goodbye to local control over all Illinois parks and expect to see open drug and alcohol use, needles, no sanitation and fire hazards, but no ordinary park users.
Well I don’t think other states are doing better though…
Some are as bad but some are much better and have, at a minimum, a push notification system to tell you when and where appointments are available. How many there are of each is unclear at this point.
Illinois is totally incompetent. Employers should have been given the job, my company does flu shots every year, no problem.
What about the retired folks?
What’s the chain of command, who’s supposed to be running the show, who’s responsible for coordinating state wide effort??–IDPH with our work remotely indefinitely/zero layoff/ zero risk/ just got a giant pay raise essential worker AFSCME heros? Cook county health? Chicago dept of health??…
I’ve shared with our readers that I’ve had no luck in helping my mother secure an appointment at one of the two major hospital networks she’s visited frequently in recent years. She’s 81 and a cancer survivor, so she should be a priority for the vaccine (the good news is today she is quite healthy and very active). On Sunday, we spent two additional hours scouring the web, with zero luck. The process was super frustrating. Well, this morning my mother solved the problem herself, she called to tell me. Through a tip from a friend, she contacted a clinic… Read more »
Where is Gov Pritzker’s leadership on getting out in front of this failure and fixing it? Pritzker is the one that was granted executive powers!
Why cant the state create a website where you request an appointment and they tell you WHERE and WHEN to show up. Instead of trying to hunt down an opening. SC has done this and it works. May take 2-4 weeks but you get an appointment and they tell you wher and when to go. SO SIMPLE
That’s what’s so ridiculous. It really is a very easy tech project today.
If anyone wonders what is the harm in patronage/nepotism appointments to benefits-laden State jobs, and awarding IT contracts based upon political relationships rather than merit…
this is the harm.
It’s going to explode at some point. They’re screwing with people’s lives – literally!
Agree sooner or later it’s gonna go up in smoke, people are at wits end just remember folks 2022 is closer than we realize remove this individual in Springfield.
But the Democrats are screwing with white people which is totally acceptable in today’s world. They are all trump voters and are domestic terrorists anyway according to the media. Vaccines are prioritized to south and west sides. If they don’t want to get vaccinated, who cares. I’m sick of hearing about the sickening racial disparity on every channel . It’s all intended to set all elderly, disabled, immune compromised, cancer and heart patients up to wait for months so Loris commie CTU scum can go ahead. It’s all for the kids. Anyone who votes democrat is an idiot.
Yet Lightfoot already has her vaccination. Hmm. If stats are correct regarding the who/what/when on shots, there are a LOT of under-65 adults getting vaccinated because they’ve medical and/or university affiliation, even though they’ve zero contact with patients or Covid environments. Ditto at City Hall, Cook County Courts, and County Jail, all those administrators and lawyers. Lots of folks, ahead of senior citizens. And yes, there are those politicians who shimmied to the front-of-line, all those healthy under-65 progressive politicians who’ve already been vaccinated – Underwood? Duckworth? Lightfoot? I’m in my early 60s, healthy lifestyle but with preexisting medical history… Read more »
I hope you can get vaccinated soon. It’s a total scam.
White elderly people are purposefully discriminated against by the democrat socialist party. Lori and Pritzker must never be re-elected. Northwestern only vaccinates those over 65 from south and west side and Latino zip codes. White people start at 79 but no appointments are available, only for ghetto types. And now the CTU commies will be passing over all people so Lori can get them to support her in the next election.
Totally agree. Talk about RACIST. A white person has no chance. The obese and sickly made their own beds by eating all that crap. We have to pay. Also, we pay to keep the system running. TOO many TAKERS
It’s like the old Ticketmaster days when you’d refresh your browser and randomly be able to pick up great seats that someone else had already queued up but failed to complete the transaction.
Welcome to the Socialist Democrat run state of Illinois.
I really hope that prison inmates and terrorists get vaccinated before my 89 yr old father whos also a korean war veteran,way to go pritzker!-you should be nominated for the nobel peace prize for your outstanding leadership!
Or a daytime Emmy award like Cuomo (the granny killer)
Yep!!
Soooo,elderly people are having a hard time getting the vaccine,BUT,lori lightfoot,toni preckwinkle,tammy duckworth and many other politicians got their vaccine?-hmmm,well imagine that,i wouldnt expect it any other way in Illinois,doesnt surprise me in the least
Bingo
And pretty Lori got a haircut too when no one else could because she’s the FACE of the city.
Lets not forget,she takes her personal hygiene VERY seriously
She should put a bag over that face.
Echoing the two comments below, this is the most incompentent, fowled system on the face of the earth. I’ve probably spent far more than the 3 hours hypothoized in the article. The Gov and his staff only had 6 months to figure this out. Just criminal!
My parents are 86 and 88, have a long list of comorbidities, and reside in McLean County (Bloomington area). I tried for over a month to get them a vaccine appointment through the state system, our county health department, a local hospital, and their doctor, all to no avail. Following a tip from a frustrated county health department employee I discovered that HyVee and Jewel Osco were doing a great job of getting people scheduled and vaccinated. Problem solved. It doesn’t surprise me that the private sector is once again blowing away state and local government. Best of luck to… Read more »
Can’t the stupid Dictator do anything right?
Keep voting Democrats in, it’s GREAT here!