KITCHENER -- The County of Wellington has reassigned 25 staff members to help with COVID-19 vaccination clinics in the region.

Staff will help with entering data from consent forms at mobile sites and the hub site at the former Groves Memorial Hospital in Fergus.

The region said the province is using a software system called COVAX, which populates recipient information in real time. Reassigning county staff will help make the process more efficient.

“The size and scope of the project of providing everyone in our region a COVID-19 vaccine who wishes to have one will require a major collaborative effort,” said Dr. Nicola Mercer, Medical Officer of Health and CEO, Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health, in a news release.

“The County of Wellington will continue to support Dr. Mercer and the Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health team in any way possible,” Warden Kelly Linton said in the release. “Having County staff take on the data entry component of the vaccination clinics will expedite the vaccine roll out. The faster we can get people vaccinated, the faster we can resume a sense of normalcy in our lives.”

The staff are still county employees, but will work with public health for three to six months. More county staff will be redeployed if needed.