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Kern County, United Farm Workers Providing Vaccines To Over 4,000 Farmworkers

Courtesy of the United Farm Worker Foundation

Over 1,000 farm workers in Kern County received their first round of vaccines last weekend in Delano. The United Farm Workers  and partnering organizations have plans to vaccinate thousands more in the coming weeks. 

The UFW , in partnership with the Kern County Latino COVID-19 Task Force, is vaccinating farm workers every weekend for the next three weeks as part of the county’s initiative to get more farm workers vaccinated. For the first weekend, UFW President Teresa Romero said 500 people were registered for each day. 

 

“We had probably a hundred people each day that did not register, but we were still able to give them the vaccination,” Romero said, adding that it’s better for farmworkers to register in advance. The only thing they need to provide is a form of ID. 

 

Romero wants farm workers to know they don’t have to fear the vaccine process because of their legal status. “We’re not asking for any legal residency,” Romero said. “We aren’t asking for anything other than some health questions.” 

 

The vaccine site is located at The 40 Acres in Delano. 

 

“It’s a place where farm workers feel at home,” Romero said. “That’s the beginning, where the movement started, where Cesar Chavez started organizing and started the boycott.”  

 

To register, call the UFW Foundation's hotline at 661-501-4280  or the Project Abuelita hotline from the Kern County Latino COVID-19 Task Force at 661-525-5900. 

Madi Bolanos covered immigration and underserved communities for KVPR from 2020-2022. Before joining the station, she interned for POLITCO in Washington D.C. where she reported on US trade and agriculture as well as indigenous women’s issues during the Canadian election. She earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism with a minor in anthropology from San Francisco State University. Madi spent a semester studying at the Danish Media and Journalism School where she covered EU policies in Brussels and alleged police brutality at the Croatian-Serbian border.