COVID-19 vaccinations in B.C. now open to anyone 60 and older

Syringes with COVID-19 vaccine in them are pictured at a clinic in Metro Vancouver on March 25. (Ben Nelms/CBC - image credit)

With close to one million British Columbians having received a first shot of COVID-19 vaccine, officials announced on Saturday that people aged 60 and older could register for their turn.

The jump in age cohort is a big one. As of Thursday, those 65 and older could call to register.

On Saturday, the province sent out a release bumping that up five years, to those people born in 1961 or earlier.

Indigenous people 18 or older and those who are clinically extremely vulnerable can also now register to book their vaccine appointment through B.C.'s new Get Vaccinated system.

The province is also vaccinating people between the ages of 55 and 65 with the AstraZeneca vaccine in local pharmacies throughout the province.

People wait in line to receive an AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine at a Shoppers Drug Mart in Vancouver on March 31.(CBC News)

Health Minister Adrian Dix said on Saturday that the province was able to move up the age for registration because of availability of vaccine.

"We're increasingly confident in our expectations around supply in the coming weeks," he said, adding that people who register now should be able to book appointments to get the jab in the next few weeks.

The province says that since the Get Vaccinated provincial registration and booking system started on April 6, nearly 650,000 British Columbians have registered and more than 170,000 have booked their shot.

40,000 jabs a day

Nearly 170 mass vaccinations clinics throughout the province are now operating.

The province hopes to vaccinate around 40,000 people a day.

So far, 1,025,019 doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been administered, with 87,606 of those being second doses. A record high of 40,018 people were vaccinated in B.C. on Thursday.

Dix said that some vaccine would be set aside from the age-based vaccination program, to be used in communities where transmission is high, as was done in Prince Rupert and for education workers in the Surrey school board.

"And that will continue as an additional tool to deal with public outbreaks," he said.

Dix also said on Saturday that the province is on track to have all eligible adults vaccinated in the province by the end of June.

"We're absolutely on track to do that," he said. "We're pretty confident."