PORTSMOUTH — On Wednesday (March 3) of this week, another 160 people were scheduled to have received their first dose of the COVID vaccine at the town clinic at Raytheon Co.’s Providence Building. Next Wednesday, March 10, 160 more should get their shots.

“After that, we’re pretty much closing down,” said Ray Perry, director of Portsmouth Emergency Management.

While the clinic will continue through April 7 so those already vaccinated can receive their second scheduled dose, a total of only 760 doses were made available for the Raytheon site. 

Volunteers wish they could do more, said Mr. Perry.

“This is a pod that can do 1,000 doses a day,” he said. “Raytheon invested in this — they put money into the building. We did a lot of work and planning. It’s kind of a disappointment.”

The problem is, the municipal clinic has been competing for doses with the state vaccine clinics as well as those operated by private businesses such as CVS. “We also had to register each person ourselves, and that took a long time,” Mr. Perry added.

He hopes that some of the volunteers at Raytheon can be used at the new mass vaccination clinic the state is opening next week at the former Benny’s store on West Main Road. 

“Most of this is volunteers — community people — and they want to keep doing it,” he said.

While Portsmouth’s site is set up to vaccinate people 75 years of age and older under state guidelines, there have been a few residents younger than that who received shots. Mr. Perry explained why.

Once a vial is opened, all 10 or 11 doses within must be used or they are wasted. In a few cases, people under 75 have been given the vaccine because volunteers don’t want to see any doses squandered, Mr. Perry said.

“That usually happens at the end of the clinic,” he said. “We actually know there’s more 75 and older people out there, but we have no idea how to get hold of them, so we are dipping down. But we’re only talking about a few people. If we had kept it as just 75 and up, we would have lost doses.”

Under state guidelines, the clinic has been vaccinating the oldest people first, he added. “But they do give us permission to go below that if we’re stuck,” Mr. Perry said.

Because it’s so difficult to quickly locate unregistered residents 75 and older to receive unused doses, Mr. Perry said in retrospect he wished he had advertised to ask “people a little bit younger” to also register. 

“In a way, it is a little bit unfair, but our backs are against the wall,” he said of vaccinating a handful of people under 75. “There are some clinics out there who didn’t do that, and they lost doses.”

At the same time, he said if the clinic had advertised for “65 and above, we would be inundated with calls. We wouldn’t be able to handle it.”

Some people under 75 with special medical conditions have also called the clinic, pleading for the vaccine, he said.

“We’re hearing all these gut-wrenching calls — ‘I have this medical condition.’ But we have to tell them that we have to go by state guidelines,” Mr. Perry said. “And we’re not doctors, so we can’t make a determination on their medical condition. It’s actually pretty emotional for the people here who are doing the registrations.”

Son gets dad’s shot

In one special case, a local man under 75 got his first dose of the vaccination because his father was unable to receive it.

Lucille and Thomas Hyder, both in their 90s, were scheduled to receive the vaccine on Feb. 17, the first day of the clinic at Raytheon, Mr. Perry said. Their son Stephen was going to bring them there.

“Unfortunately, Stephen's dad passed away the day before the appointment,” Mr. Perry said. “Stephen wanted the workers to know there was an extra dose. The staff immediately knew what to do and Stephen was registered and screened for the vaccine so that he could receive the dose that would have gone to his dad.”