More than 2,000 community members signed up to get a COVID-19 vaccination at a Maryland hospital after an internal email sent to employees was forwarded to friends, family members and others outside the hospital system who are not yet eligible to receive the vaccine, according to a Jan. 4 WUSA report.
Officials at Holy Cross Health in Silver Spring, Md., emailed its medical staff members on Jan. 1 to remind them to sign up for an appointment to get the COVID-19 vaccine. The email was then forwarded to members of the community outside of eligible individuals in Group 1A to sign up for the vaccine.
After reviewing the vaccine sign-up sheet, Holy Cross officials said more than 2,000 community members signed up for spots for which they were not eligible.
"At this point in time, Holy Cross Hospital and Holy Cross Germantown Hospital have only enough vaccine to take care of colleagues and active medical staff. We are only vaccinating colleagues and active medical staff and not the community at large," the medical system said in a statement, according to the report.
The health system asked Prepmod, the system that Maryland is using for vaccine clinic registration and sign up, to cancel the spots that community members signed up for. People outside of Group 1A will receive an email that their appointment has been canceled.