Colorado Launches Coronavirus Vaccine Hotline

A new COVID-19 vaccine hotline has been launched in Colorado, public health officials announced in a virtual news conference Monday.

Fifty operators are available to answer calls and can provide information in multiple languages, officials said. The staff are trained to answer questions about COVID-19 vaccines, vaccine providers and general information about the virus.

Staffing will expand "as call volume requires," public health officials said during the news conference.

The toll-free number is 1-877-268-2926. Through the end of January, the call center will be open from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, health officials said. Beginning Feb. 1, hours will extend to 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

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Scott Bookman, incident commander with the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, said the new hotline is "one more tool to help Coloradans."

"We’re doing all we can to keep providing these different points of access," Bookman said during the news conference. "The biggest challenge here is there just isn’t enough vaccine. If we could have 5 million doses of vaccine tomorrow, we would take it."

Colorado is expected to ramp up its vaccine administration significantly over the next few weeks. The state's goal is to have 70 percent of people ages 70 and older inoculated by the end of February.