Southern Arizona COVID-19 Vaccination Clinics Go Mobile
People gather outside a community center for a MOVE-UP clinic hosted by UArizona Health Sciences in the rural town of Aguila, Arizona, to get COVID-19 vaccine shots.
A University of Arizona Health Sciences effort to get the COVID-19 vaccine to hard-to-reach communities in Arizona has administered about 10,000 shots as part of the Mobile Outreach Vaccination and Education for Underserved Populations (MOVE UP) program.
MOVE UP clinics recently expanded to southern Arizona, beginning with an April 23 clinic at the Consulate of Mexico in Douglas. The event, held in partnership with the Cochise County Health Department, focused on vaccinating agricultural laborers and also offered vaccinations to the general public. About 200 people were vaccinated at a second MOVE UP vaccine clinic April 28 at the Consulate of Mexico in Nogales, Arizona, held in partnership with the Santa Cruz County Health Department. It focused on vaccinating truck drivers who transport produce across the border.
The clinics are staffed by faculty and student volunteers from the College of Medicine – Tucson, College of Medicine – Phoenix, College of Nursing and College of Pharmacy, as well as staff and volunteers from the College of Public Health.
Click through the images to see your Health Sciences peers and students hard at work getting Arizona vaccinated, and read more about the MOVE UP program.
Intake staff at a COVID-19 vaccine clinic hosted by UArizona Health Sciences in the early morning hours of April 23 at the Mexican Consulate in Douglas, Ariz., as part of the Mobile Outreach Vaccination & Education for Underserved Populations, or MOVE UP, initiative. Andrea Contreras (on right in red), Maria Jaime (on right in blue), and Ana Karen Montaño (standing) register and check in Angel Loya (left in yellow) and Oscar Moreno (left in gray hat).
Cecilia Rosales, MD, and Sheila Soto, MPH, director and manager of the Tucson mobile health unit at the UArizona Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health, review packaging for the COVID-19 vaccines to be administered at a clinic hosted April 23 at the Mexican Consulate in Douglas, Ariz. Initially for farmworkers crossing over from Mexico starting at 3 a.m., the clinic was open to the public from 7 to 11 a.m.
College of Medicine – Tucson senior Abdullah Aleem gives farm work supervisor Rubén Sosa a COVID-19 vaccine shot. The goal of MOVE UP is to promote more inclusive participation of rural and underrepresented groups in getting the vaccine among hard-to-reach populations in partnership with the UArizona Health Sciences, state and county health departments and other local partnerships.
Rubén Sosa, a farm work supervisor, stretches after his shot to get greater circulation of the COVID-19 vaccine throughout his system.
College of Medicine – Tucson senior medical student Maya Sarihan gives a COVID-19 vaccine shot to an agricultural laborer April 23 at the Mexican Consulate in Douglas, Arizona, as part of a MOVE UP clinic hosted by UArizona Health Sciences.
College of Nursing student Graham Robinson gets instruction on how to measure an appropriate dosage of the COVID-19 vaccine to be administered to patients at a MOVE UP clinic at the Consulate of Mexico in Douglas in partnership with the UArizona Health Sciences and Cochise County Health Department. Fellow Nursing student Jane Leahy is to left of him.
College of Nursing vaccinators prepare vaccines for a COVID-19 clinic hosted April 23 by UArizona Health Sciences and Cochise County Health Department at the Mexican Consulate in Douglas, Arizona.
The Mexico port of entry at the U.S. border in Douglas, Arizona. Across the border is Agua Prieta, Sonora, a town of about 70,000 people who are largely agriculture and factory assembly workers.
College of Medicine – Tucson student Maya Sarihan (standing) gets instructions from College of Nursing preceptor Heather Carlisle, PhD, DNP, RN, on administering a COVID-19 vaccine for client Ruby Chávez Olivares (seated).
Public Health student and scribe Diana Grijalva (on right in front) writes as College of Nursing preceptor Nancy McGuckin, RN, MSN, MPH (standing with white hair) advises her. On the left, Nursing student Valerie Pedersen prepares to vaccinate a patient (center). Behind (on right) are College of Medicine senior students Maya Sarihan and Abdullah Aleem, who also participated as vaccinators.
College of Nursing student Valerie Pedersen gives a woman a COVID-19 vaccine at a MOVE UP clinic at the Consulate of Mexico in Douglas hosted by UArizona Health Sciences in partnership with the Cochise County Health Department.
Many agriculture laborers cross the border daily to work on U.S. farms, including here in Douglas, Arizona, which has less than a quarter the population of Agua Prieta, Sonora, the town that lies immediately south in Mexico.
College of Nursing student Kathleen Gies vaccinates a patient at a MOVE UP COVID-19 clinic held by UArizona Health Sciences in Douglas, Ariz., in partnership with the Cochise County Health Department and Consulate of Mexico.
Zuckerman College of Public Health student José Angel Almeida (left) helps Oscar Moreno with his initial intake for registration at a COVID-19 vaccine clinic hosted April 23 by UArizona Health Sciences at the Consulate of Mexico in Douglas, Arizona.
Farmworkers from Agua Prieta, Mexico, gather before dawn at the Mexican Consulate in Douglas for a COVID-19 vaccine clinic hosted by the UArizona Health Sciences, Cochise County Health Department (from left): Oscar Moreno, Mara Rodríguez, Jairo López, Rubén Sosa, Nestor Quiñonez, and Jesús Pérez.
Aguila, Arizona, is a largely agricultural community of less than 1,000 people 25 miles west of Wickenburg in Maricopa County. The area near Phoenix is known for growing cantaloupes, watermelon and wheat.
Fields being prepared for planting near the community center in Aguila, Arizona, an agricultural community west of Phoenix in Maricopa County with a population that’s more than 98% Hispanic/LatinX.
Brenda Cota Valenzuela, a health educator with the UArizona Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health in Phoenix, passes boxes to fellow health educators and promotoras Alma Ramírez and Maria Jaime (both in doorway) with Maryell Martínez (pointing) on left. They’re setting up a MOVE UP clinic to administer COVID-19 vaccines and conduct health screenings at the community center in Aguila, Ariz.
People gather outside a community center for a MOVE-UP clinic hosted by the UArizona Health Sciences in the rural town of Aguila, Ariz., to get COVID-19 vaccine shots. The mobile health unit van of the UArizona Zuckerman College of Public Health is visible in background.
Alma Ramirez, a health educator with the College of Public Health, greets people at the community center in Aguila, Arizona, where UArizona Health Sciences provided free COVID-19 vaccinations.
Maria Jaime, a health educator with the College of Public Health in Phoenix, goes through a patient’s answers on her registration, while vaccinator Alvin Wong, DO, an internal medicine physician with the UArizona College of Medicine – Phoenix, prepares the vaccine.
Alvin Wong, DO, a clinical associate professor with the College of Medicine – Phoenix, administers a COVID-19 vaccine to a patient at the community center in Aguila, Arizona, a rural agricultural community west of Phoenix in Maricopa County.
People from the rural agricultural community of Aguila, Arizona, stay for observation to make sure they don’t have any adverse reactions from the COVID-19 vaccine.
A train hauls grain by a farm near the community center in Aguila, Arizona, the site of a MOVE UP clinic to get COVID-19 vaccines to hard-to-reach rural and underrepresented populations.