A group of Josephine County Public Health workers were returning from a vaccination clinic in southern Oregon when they got stranded in a snowstorm. The workers still had six doses of the COVID-19 vaccine leftover and had recipients lined up in a nearby town.
Unfortunately, the workers never made it after they got stuck in the snow. Instead of letting the vaccines go to waste, they decided to offer the doses to other motorists who were also stranded by the winter weather. The workers went car-to-car and vaccinated people on the snow-covered highway.
"We had one individual who was so happy, he took his shirt off and jumped out of the car," Michael Weber, the public health director in Josephine County, told the New York Times.
One of the people who got a vaccine was a Josephine County Sheriff's Office employee who missed her appointment at the clinic because of the bad weather.
Officials said that there was an ambulance nearby in case anybody had an adverse reaction, but it was not needed.
Oregon has received over 300,000 doses of the vaccine and is in the first phase of its vaccination rollout program. Eligible recipients are broken down into four groups, which include frontline healthcare workers, residents, and staff at long-term care facilities and adults who have medical conditions that require treatment at their homes. The state estimates there are about 400,000 people in those groups. Officials have not determined when they will begin vaccinating other people, including teachers and members of the general public.