In the US, if the CDC has recommended a shot for someone in your demographic, any pharmacist can write the prescription for you and administer the shot. Sometimes the name on the prescription isn’t the same as the name of the person who gave the shot, too.
They ask for your health insurance so they can get paid, but they also accept cash.
Scheduled COVID & Flu for Sunday afternoon
Who knows WTF is going on? Wife, younger daughter and I each had appointments to get the COVID shot Monday, and 3 different CVS’s (wife and I about 3 miles apart, daughter 90 miles away). Wife and daughter each got notified today that their Monday appointments were canceled. I did not. But since wife had to reschedule, she made an appointment for the closest CVS accepting Wed appts (none Monday or Tuesday), about 10 miles from here. It did not indicate the closer CVS’s had any appointments before Thurs at the earliest. So just in case I made an appointment Wednesday too.
Both my Monday and Wed appt were made at CVS.com, with the same e-mail and phone (also same name and same birthdate), so I’m somewhat surprised they let me make both. I’ll call Monday and keep that one if they have the vaccine and are doing shots, since that CVS is within walking distance (about 1.2 mile but within a block of someplace else I will be Monday anyway).
I had an appointment for a covid shot today, but got call that they haven’t received any vaccine, even though they were promised it. I’m rescheduled for Thursday, but they didn’t seem confident that they’d get it.
I had a friend that had an appointment yesterday, they had it, but told her that the insurance company hadn’t created the code for billing it yet, so she also had to reschedule. I hope all this is cleared up by the time I go Thursday afternoon.
UHC?
Not sure, she works for a different company from me. But UHC is literally the worst, so very likely.
Fortunately neither wife nor I have UHC, so maybe we’ll be OK. I’m not sure about daughter’s insurance.
Both wife and I are medicare-eligible, and she has medicare supplement, so I think she’s OK if medicare is (since supplement shouldn’t be relevant as long as medicare is supposed to pay). Mine is medicare advantage, so perhaps the insurer (which is not UHC) is supposed to pay.
The CPT and NDC codes for the updated booster have been around since at least August 14th, so that seems like a very unlikely reason to me.
Could take some time to be cascaded down though.
I would think?
She called her insurance and that’s what they told her, as well as CVS.
Done + Flu
Just because the insurer knew they would have to enter this number doesn’t mean they got around to doing so.
But how incredibly annoying.
Personally, I’m hoping the Novavax version is approved soon, and if so, I will get that. Gotta catch 'em all. (I’ve had Pfizer, J&J, and Moderna, in that order.) But also, according to Your Local Epidemiologist the side effects from Novavax are milder. The studies she links suggest it might not be quite as good, but the results are pretty similar.
Couldn’t I simply pay for my vaccine and bill my insurance company for reimbursement?
This is something I like about the Canadian healthcare system: no paperwork, no intermediaries. Just show your health card when you show up for your shot and you’re done.
I would think so, but there might be some gap between your charge and insurance company charge
Got the shot 2 hours ago. (As originally scheduled, even though wife and younger daughter had their appointments for today cancelled. All 3 of us were scheduled at different CVS’s.) Feel fine so far. Wife got a shot at Walgren’s today (5 hours ago, very minor arm soreness is all).
Almost forgot about this thread. The past few weeks the appointments were hard to find so I figured I’d just circle back around, and now things are wide open, getting the flu shot and the new Moderna covid thing in a half hour.
Given the past side effects, I won’t be getting them until a more quiet time in my social calendar. Like quarter end 
. I will get both flu and COVID booster shots this fall.