Fuming Charlie Baker bends to pressure following website crash, to rollout preregistration for coronavirus vaccines

A fuming Gov. Charlie Baker finally bent to pressure from politicians, saying he’d soon “have more to say” about a centralized preregistration system for coronavirus vaccinations after a meltdown of the state’s website left thousands unable to book appointments.

The state’s vaccine portal — vaxfinder.mass.gov — repeatedly crashed early Thursday morning as 1 million people newly eligible for shots clamored for appointments, but were greeted by error messages instead.

For some, the website would appear to briefly show scheduling availability, only to crash again moments later — creating a sense of deja vu from the technical glitches and fully booked calendars that plagued signups for those 75 and older just weeks ago.

“My hair’s on fire about the whole thing. I can’t even begin to tell you how pissed off I am and people are working really hard to get it fixed,” Baker said on GBH’s Boston Public Radio.

A day earlier the Republican governor expressed confidence in the state’s web infrastructure, saying it was in “good shape” to handle the influx of newly eligible vying for 70,000 new appointments set to be released. Eligibility on Thursday morning was expanded to people 65 and older and those who have two or more qualifying health conditions.

“Obviously the scenario work that we did didn’t adequately prepare the site from when 8 o’clock rolled around,” Baker said

By 11:30 a.m. appointments at mass vaccination sites in Springfield, Danvers, Natick and Dartmouth were booked out for the next week, even as extreme winter weather in the South threatened to delay shipments of vaccine to Massachusetts. Many were still able to book appointments — after hours of delays — at Fenway Park and Gillette Stadium.

A COVID-19 Command Center spokeswoman, apologizing for the delays, blamed the technical difficulties on “extremely high traffic” on the state VaxFinder website.

Democrats were quick to slam Baker over the state’s tumultuous vaccine rollout.

Senate President Karen Spilka said she was “deeply disappointed” that so many were “feeling frustration and anger on a day when we should be experiencing hope.”

House Speaker Ronald Mariano said he was among the thousands frustrated as he was trying to schedule a shot.

The leaders of the Legislature’s new Joint COVID-19 and Emergency Management and Preparedness Committee vowed to bring Baker and Health Secretary Marylou Sudders before an oversight panel next week.

“We’ve been continually disappointed by how Massachusetts and the Baker-Polito administration is handling the rollout,” House Chairman Rep. William Driscoll, D-Milton, told the Herald. “The list of questions is just getting longer.”

The committee on Wednesday announced the series of oversight hearings on the state’s “constantly changing and confusing vaccination roll out,” citing growing anger and frustration of constituents.

from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/3jYQLig