The Student Health Center promotes COVID-19 safety through a sign located near the Health Center reminding community members to mask up. The Student Health Center is now offering COVID-19 vaccines, COVID-19 booster shots and flu shots. Photo by Abby Wilt
Booster shots, initial COVID-19 vaccines and now flu shots. The Student Health Center distributes vaccines for students, most at no cost, through clinics and scheduled appointments.
The Moderna and Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines are available to all eligible community members, in addition to the Pfizer booster shot through the SHC. Flu shots are also available to all community members at no cost.
Booster Shots
The SHC now offers COVID-19 Pfizer booster shots for those who are eligible. To be eligible for a booster shot, community members must be either 65 years and older, ages 18 or older who live in long-term care settings, ages 18 or older who have underlying medical conditions or ages 18 or older who work or live in high-risk settings.
An example of workers who are eligible are those who are first responders, food and agriculture workers, public transit workers and manufacturing workers.
The University encourages those eligible to get a booster shot, as studies show protection against the virus may decrease over time and be less able to protect against the Delta variant, according to the Pepperdine website.
Esther Chung, second-year graduate student at School of Public Policy, said she received an email that informed her she could get a booster shot at the Health Center. Chung received her COVID-19 booster shot at the SHC and said she felt fine the first day but felt the side effects the second.
“Because I work with students and I work in higher ed — I get to get the booster shot,” Chung said.
Chung said she wanted the booster because she wanted to be as protected from the virus as possible before she visited her parents in Korea.
“I’m going to go visit them in December, and they asked me to take my booster shot before I come,” Chung said.
Chung said she hasn’t heard of very many people who have received their booster shot from Pepperdine, mostly because they didn’t know it was an option.
“I think I was one of the first ones who was from my group to get one,” Chung said.
Moderna and Pfizer Vaccine Clinic
Every Thursday from 8:30 a.m., to 4:30 p.m., the SHC offers vaccine clinics, where all community members 16 years and older can receive first and second doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines at no cost. Community members must schedule an appointment through the Health Center to receive a vaccine at the clinic.
As of Oct. 8, the SHC administered 1,615 vaccine doses altogether.
As of Oct. 27, 87.7% of Pepperdine community members received both doses of the initial COVID-19 vaccine, 86.5% of students are vaccinated and 91.5% of faculty and staff are vaccinated, according to the Pepperdine COVID-19 dashboard.
Flu Shot Vaccine Clinic
The SHC additionally provides free flu shot vaccine clinics to all community members, with no appointment necessary. The vaccine clinics are scheduled for Nov. 3, Nov. 9, Nov. 16, Nov. 17 and Dec. 1, all from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
If community members cannot make it to a flu shot vaccine clinic, they can schedule an appointment for a free flu shot by calling the Student Health Center.
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Contact Abby Wilt via Twitter (@abby_wilt) or by email: abby.wilt@pepperdine.edu
