VASA Fitness in Colorado Springs offers COVID-19 vaccine clinics this week

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) - You can get a COVID-19 vaccine at the gym this week -- UCHealth and VASA Fitness are partnering up to ensure Coloradans get vaccinated. VASA is hosting two vaccine clinics this week, no appointments or gym memberships are necessary for the walk-in clinics and it is open to the general public.

UCHealth will offer the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine at the clinics. UCHealth has administered more than 615,000 doses of vaccine across Colorado.

Dates, times and location for the clinics are:

• Monday, May 24, 4 p.m.-8 p.m., VASA Fitness, 3020 N. Nevada Ave.
• Tuesday, May 25, 4 p.m-8 p.m., VASA Fitness, 455 E. Cheyenne Mountain Blvd. 
• Saturday, June 5, 8 a.m.-noon., VASA Fitness, 3020 N. Nevada Ave.

It's an effort to target a younger segment of the southern colorado population.

" So during the COVID-19 surge we were seeing a huge elderly population, that is not what we are seeing now, because majority of the elders got vaccinated, now we are seeing mostly the 20-40 year olds in ICU beds which is kind of unheard of," said Carolyn Carroll Flynn, the Nurse Manager for UCHealth South region.

According to Carolyn Carroll Flynn with UCHealth, the percentage of 20 to 40 year-olds getting vaccinated in El Paso County is low.

"A little over of 25 percent of 20-29 years-old in the county are vaccinated and about 35-40 percent of our 30-39 year-olds are vaccinated so this is really the age demographic we would like to sit down and talk to," added Carroll Flynn.

A reason why Amy Anderson, the general manager at VASA Fitness puts an emphasis on safety first.

"We faced a lot of challenges and adversity but our biggest focus was to provide a safe environment for our members to feel comfortable," said Anderson.

VASA Fitness is one of the largest gyms in Southern Colorado with about 22-thousand members combined at both locations - which is why when given the opportunity to host something like this, they were more than happy to do it.
"We just wanted to make sure that we were giving to the community an opportunity to do their part and our part in getting vaccinated," added Anderson.