March 28, 2021 — Today we opened a new pop-up clinic serving the Del Paso Heights, Oak Knoll, and Johnson Heights neighborhoods of North Sacramento. 

Shante Williams and José Gutierrez of the Mutual Assistance Network knocked on doors, called their members, and got the Robertson Community Center ready to welcome over one thousand members of the community.

A Diverse Impact

• 702 of the registrants and walk-ins came from first and second quartile zipcodes—an important metric in ensuring vaccines are going to the places hardest-hit by COVID-19
• 78% of registrants were Black, Indigenous, or people of color
• 24% were uninsured
• 20% did not speak English, with the most common languages being Spanish, Hmong, Iu-Mien, and Dari

Mobilizing to Serve

Equivax volunteers mobilized for the opportunity. With 48 hours' notice, more than 150 volunteers signed up to work at the Robertson Center to ensure a seamless experience for the community members—and they sure did!

At today's noon peak, we served one member every 9 seconds (400 per hour).

Our registration team was one of the fastest and most accurate in our clinics to date. Even as the line swelled to wrap around the basketball court, the longest wait time was only 14 minutes from outside to registration, and from there it was less than 20 minutes to discharge. Our hospitality team provided bottled water and snacks to community members waiting in line and provided sandwiches and tacos from a local restaurant to keep our volunteers well-fed. The data entry team, vaccination lane captains, queue managers, and discharge team all rocked it. And our pre-registration personalized medical consultation with Dr. Yvonne Otani and Selena Srabian helped screen potential issues and route higher-risk patients to a dedicated vaccination area for extended observation and additional care. 

County and City Support

The clinic again succeeded with help from both Sacramento County and Sacramento City working together to provide essential resources to the clinic. The County, under the direction of Dr. Olivia Kasirye, has continued to prioritize communities most hard-hit by the virus and has made vaccines available to community pop-up clinics like the one we had today. ​​City of Sacramento IT, headed on-site by Adam Moore, delivered more than 14 laptops and 10 iPads which worked seamlessly for registration, discharge, and data entry. 

Community Gratitude

The outpouring of gratitude from our diverse patients today was overwhelming. Some community members even reached out to ask how they could support more clinics like these. We referred them to our website and to the Mutual Assistance Network to support the seeds of the grassroots community organizing and the outreach that makes these clinics possible.