King Clinic Family Doctors / Walk-in Clinic

Good morning:

First King City Medical Assocates likes to wish a very Happy Mother's Day to all our mothers and mothers o be!

Second please see this letter from York region as we received it this morning.

Today, York Region is announcing the opening of additional vaccination appointments and expanding eligibility to include:

• York Region residents age 40+
• People who cannot work from home (Group 2)
• Individuals living with at-risk health conditions
• Moderate priority health care workers

Starting Monday, May 10, 2021 at 8:30 a.m., those eligible can begin to book an appointment for their COVID-19 vaccination through york.ca/COVID19Vaccine or by calling Access York at 1-877-464-9675.

All other previously announced eligible priority groups, including licensed child care, special education staff and elementary and secondary school workers who live or work in York Region, can continue to book appointments at york.ca/COVID19Vaccine   

Approximately 78,000 appointments will be opened to eligible residents and are expected to book quickly. Given the expected high volume of web activity and telephone support, wait times may be longer than usual and services disruptions on york.ca may occur.

We are promoting this announcement on our social channels. As a reminder, below are the links to our Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts. Please like, share and re-tweet as you wish.

https://www.facebook.com/YorkRegionGovt/

https://twitter.com/YorkRegionGovt

https://www.instagram.com/YorkRegionGovt/

Thanks and stay safe!

King City medical Assocaites.

May 9th, 2021

Mother's Day!

Dear patients please see the most recent media release from York region.

What is New:

1- Age 35+ who LIVE OR WORK in 16 York region high priority area

 New codes: Vaughan: L0J , L3L  Markham: L3T, L6B, L6C, L6E  Richmond Hill: L4B , L4C, L4E (Town of East Gwillimbury:  L9N 

In addition to previous postal codes: L4H, L4J, L4K, L4L, L6A and L3S.

2- Licensed Child Care staff (documentation required)

Here is the detailed media release:

Those age 35+ who live or work in 16 high priority areas now eligible for vaccines

Effective Tuesday, May 4, 2021 beginning at 8:30 a.m., individuals age 35+ who live or work in any of York Region’s 16 high priority areas are now eligible to book an appointment for their COVID-19 vaccination. 

Appointments for vaccines can be booked by visiting york.ca/COVID19Vaccine

COVID-19 vaccines are available to the following:

• UPDATED: Individuals age 35+ living or working (NEW) in the following identified high priority communities in York Region:
  • City of Vaughan postal codes: L0J (NEW), L3L (NEW), L4H, L4J, L4K, L4L, L6A
  • City of Markham postal codes: L3T (NEW), L6B (NEW), L6C (NEW), L6E (NEW), L3S
  • City of Richmond Hill postal codes: L4B (NEW), L4C (NEW), L4E (NEW)
  • Town of East Gwillimbury postal code: L9N (NEW)
• UPDATED: Licensed child-care staff (NEW) and special education staff who live or work in York Region (appropriate documentation required)
• All York Region residents age 60+ (born in 1961 or earlier) 
• Individuals (and one essential caregiver) with highest and high risk health conditions as identified in Ontario’s COVID-19 Vaccination Plan, including pregnant individuals
• Highest, very high and high priority health care workers as identified in the Ministry of Health’s guidance on Health Care Work Prioritization who work or live in York Region 
• Staff, essential caregivers and any residents that have not yet received a first dose in long-term care homes, retirement homes, congregate care settings for seniors and First Nations elder care homes
• Alternative level of care patients in hospitals who have a confirmed admission to a long-term care home, retirement home or other congregate care home for seniors
• Indigenous adults and members of their households
• Adults receiving home care services who live in York Region (appropriate documentation required)
• Faith leaders who live or work in York Region and provide end of life care, care of the deceased, care of those who are unwell or provides pastoral services in vulnerable settings‍

Approximately 78,000 vaccination appointments will be released for these eligible groups.

Individuals who work in York Region will require workplace identification at the time of their appointment. More information to help you prepare for your appointment is available at york.ca/covid19vaccinebeforeyougo

York Region residents age 40+ book can book a vaccination appointment at any participating pharmacy in the province or through select clinics in York Region. 

At this time, due to a shortage in vaccine supply, York Region is not offering online booking for those between the ages of 18 and 34 who live in high priority communities and residents age 50-59. However, beginning Monday, May 3, 2021, individuals ages 18+ in hot spots L0J, L3S, L3T, L4B, L4E, L4H, L4J, L4K, L4L, L6A, L6B, L6C, L6E will be eligible to book a vaccine through the provincial booking system, as will all residents 50+ beginning Thursday, May 6, 2021.

Currently, more than 410,000 York Region eligible residents have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. This represents approximately 40% of the Region’s total eligible population. York Region will continue to offer additional appointments and look to expand eligibility criteria as more vaccine becomes available.

Appointments are required. Walk-in appointments are not available. Please do not visit a vaccination clinic without an appointment – you will be turned away.

As York Region continues to experience high COVID-19 incidence, residents are reminded the best vaccine is the first one offered to you. Everyone is encouraged to take whichever vaccine is available to them as soon as possible.

A colour-coded system has been applied to the york.ca/COVID19Vaccine page to help residents easily identify which clinics may have available appointments:

• • Red: Appointments Fully Booked
  • Orange: Limited Availability
  • Green: Now Booking 

York Region Public Health is working with our local health care partners to provide COVID-19 vaccines for eligible priority group at various locations across York Region. Eligibility, clinic dates and times vary for each location. Please visit york.ca/COVID19Vaccine for specific clinic details.

Eligible individuals can book their first COVID-19 vaccination appointment online; telephone support is available and is listed under the applicable clinic.

Given the expected high volume of web activity and telephone support, wait times may be longer than usual and services disruptions on york.ca may occur. Please continue to be patient. 

As a result of no-shows and/or cancelled appointments, additional vaccine supply may become available and a small number of appointments may appear through the online booking systems. Residents are encouraged to check back often for appointments that may become available. 

York Region will continue to publicly communicate new online booking opportunities through multiple communication channels, including york.ca, social media and our media and community partners.

To ensure all appointments are available to those who are eligible, we encourage residents to book only one appointment per person and cancel any appointments they do not intend to use.

The Regional Municipality of York consists of nine local cities and towns and provides a variety of programs and services to 1.2 million residents and 54,000 businesses with 650,000 employees. More information about the Region’s key service areas is available at york.ca/regionalservices

To our patients:

As your trusted family physicians at 20 Doctor’s Lane for many years, we would like to address the concerns that some of you may have regarding the safety of the AstraZeneca vaccine against Covid-19 infection.  As you know, over 1,000,000 Canadians have been infected, and 25,000 have died.  Now is the time for all us who are eligible to be vaccinated and halt the spread of this pandemic virus.

Many of our patients take medications regularly to treat their diabetes, high cholesterol; young women take the Birth Control Pill to prevent unwanted pregnancy.  All medications carry the risk of side-effects and allergic reactions, but we accept these risks as a reasonable trade-off to get the benefit of the medication. Some adverse reactions are life-threatening but fortunately quite rare; for example, blood clots that develop while taking “the Pill”, which occur 1 per 1,000 women taking it.

We feel strongly that all three of the Covid-19 vaccines available in Canada are safe and effective at preventing illness and death due to Covid infection. The A atening blood clots are very common in Covid-infected patients with severe disease.  In other words, the benefit from all of the available vaccines far exceeds the remote risk of a blood clot or other serious side-effect.  

Remember, there is significant risk in NOT getting vaccinated; so, don’t wait to get your “preferred” vaccine: you might contract the virus while waiting!  The best Covid-19 vaccine is the one that reaches your arm first.

In order to help make Covid-19 vaccines available locally to the citizens of King Township, we have partnered with our Town Administration to set-up and staff the Vaccine Clinic running at the Trisan Centre in Schomberg.  We hope that you agree that this has been, and will continue to be, a worthwhile effort to protect all of us against this potentially deadly infection.

Paul Randall MD, Nilany Somasundaram MD,  Joseph Gergis MD

King City Medical Associates