Some Albertans struggled to book COVID-19 shots as the province’s fall immunization campaign opened to the general public on Monday.

By late afternoon, Health Link had been flooded with more than 10,000 calls related to the COVID vaccine alone and a spokesperson for Primary Care Alberta confirmed the provincial health information phone line was facing extremely high call volumes.

Booking for phase one of the province’s COVID-19 vaccination program, which offered free shots to some high risk groups, began on Sept. 29. Those groups include people with underlying medical conditions, those living in care homes, health care workers, seniors receiving the Alberta Seniors Benefit and people experiencing homelessness.