'This Is Hope': Black Doctor's COVID-19 Consortium's 24-Hour Clinic Vaccinates Over 4,000 People
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The Black Doctor's COVID-19 Consortium says their first mass vaccination clinic was a success. More than 4,000 people were inoculated in 24 hours at the vax-a-thon.
"This is hope, this is hope," Dr. Ala Stanford, the consortium's founder, said.
Hope administered with a shot in the arm.
The Black Doctors COVID-19 Consortium held a 24-hour vaccination clinic at the Liacouras Center at Temple University. The clinic was a first-of-its-kind in Philadelphia.
"It tells me that people want to live. They see this as potentially saving their lives but also giving them their livelihood back," Stanford said.
"I have a husband. I have children, grandchildren and I want to be around to be with them," Joann Cornitcher of Southwest Philadelphia said.
Now, when they were planning this clinic, they ordered 2,500 doses. And then, at about midnight, they had to make an emergency call to the city to get 1,900 more.
When Eyewitness News arrived at the center at 4 a.m. Saturday, the line was stretching around the block. Many of them were waiting for hours in the bitter cold.
Stanford says they were inundated with patients from the beginning and were never able to catch up.
"The tough part is when we started, there were 1,000 people in line when we started today and it seemed like there were 1,000 people in line all day no matter how fast we moved," she said.
Regardless of the wait times, these people say the chance to beat COVID was too important to pass up.
"Do you want to live? Have a choice, live or die," Cornitcher said.
The consortium is now gearing up to hold another clinic in three weeks for booster shots. They may also hold a second mass vaccination event for first inoculations in the future.
