LUBBOCK, Texas — Around 10,500 doses of the Moderna vaccine are set to arrive in Lubbock this week. Most doses are going to 17 local pharmacies – four of which are United Supermarkets pharmacies. On Tuesday, KAMC News spoke with United about their distribution plan.

“I know that a lot of people are very anxious about getting the vaccine,” said Crockett Tidwell, Clinical Services Manager at United Supermarket pharmacies. “But we got to take care of those frontline healthcare workers first, so that they can take care of the rest of us.”

United said that they’re looking forward to getting the Moderna vaccine, which is a lot easier to store than the Pfizer vaccine, only requiring standard refrigeration and not deep freezing.

Folks who get the vaccine will also need to get the shot twice, like Pfizer, but four weeks apart instead of three weeks.

“So once it comes in the pharmacies, we’re following the federal CDC and then state guidelines on recipients,” said Tidwell. “So right now, not everybody can get it, it’s going to be limited right now.”

In accordance with the state’s plan to distribute the vaccine, phase 1A outlines that healthcare workers, EMS workers, and those working at long term care facilities will receive the vaccine first primarily through local pharmacies. Residents in those facilities will also eventually receive the vaccine by the end of the first phase.

United explained that they hope to set up mass immunization clinics for caregivers to increase the number of vaccinations they can give each day.

“We could go through a lot of vaccine really fast, which we want to happen because we want to get it in the health care providers arms and get them healthy, so that we can move on to the next phases or the states and CDC will make the determination ‘Hey, and health care providers are protected now. So let’s move over to the essential workers,'” said Tidwell.

Tidwell said if any healthcare workers are interested in getting vaccinated at a United pharmacy, they can visit the United website to get all the latest updates.