WOODSTOCK, N.Y. >> “It’s the right thing to do,” pharmacist Neil Smoller said Friday, as he administered COVID-19 vaccines at the Village Apothecary on Tinker Street.

“COVID (vaccines) should be in people’s arms in August,” Smoller said, adding that U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had been “messing” with regulations and timing, which “really kind of threw everybody off.”

“It’s important that people get vaccines. The more people that get vaccinated, the better,” Smoller said.

“This is good public health. … No restrictions, no attestations, no nonsense,” Smoller said in an email to customers Friday morning.

At the 79 Tinker St. pharmacy Friday afternoon, Smoller vaccinated a steady stream of predominantly older folks taking advantage of his decision to vaccinate all comers. About six chairs set aside for patients seeking a vaccine were constantly filled Friday afternoon, and Smoller said he’d been much busier earlier in the day.

Smoller was pleased that, on Friday morning, Gov. Kathy Hochul signed an executive order allowing pharmacists to administer the vaccine to patients as young as 3.

“I promised New Yorkers that their family would be my fight. In the absence of federal leadership, we must do everything we can to ensure that New Yorkers have access to the vaccines and preventative healthcare they have come to rely on,” Hochul said in a statement. “By signing this executive order, we are sending a clear message that when Washington Republicans play politics with public health, New Yorkers can still get the care they need, close to home, from trusted providers in their own communities.”

The debut of updated COVID-19 vaccines has gotten off to a clunky start in many states. Limits on who can get the shots and prescription requirements are confusing customers and leaving some people worried about whether they will get protection from the virus this fall.

Kennedy has insisted that everyone who wants a shot still can get one after consulting with a doctor, but he also told a Senate committee hearing Thursday that this access “depends on the states.”

“One of the reasons vaccines were delayed — and this was just a stall tactic — was RFK decided he wanted the packages with printed inserts provided with any vaccine to be included in the box. And that’s never happened before. Because they make the vaccines early, wait for FDA (Food and Drug Administration) approval, and then they ship them, and they just put it in the box, that’s it,” Smoller said.

This year, Smoller said, holding a box of shrink-wrapped COVID-19 vaccines, “They literally had to wrap these things in Saran Wrap … to include this paperwork here that I literally throw out. Because once I have one, I don’t need any more.”

The situation is changing daily and varies by state. And it may take time for vaccine-seekers to understand how the system works now for them. But not at the Village Apothecary where “anybody that wants the vaccine can get it,” Smoller said.

Most Americans get their COVID-19 vaccines at drugstores, and many seek shots in the late summer or early fall to get protection against any winter surges in cases.

Pharmacists in most states can administer updated vaccinations without a prescription, thanks to approval of the shots from the Food and Drug Administration last week.

As of Friday morning, CVS Health — the nation’s largest drugstore chain — said its pharmacists can provide vaccines without a prescription in 38 states. Prescriptions are required in 11 states plus Washington, D.C.

That message had apparently not reached Woodstock on Friday afternoon, where a pharmacy technician who declined to give their name said the Mill Hill Road facility was still only providing vaccines to patients with a doctor’s prescription. The pharmacy was closed, they said, because the manager had just quit.

New limits on who can get a vaccine are also raising questions among customers. Previously in the U.S., the vaccines were recommended for people ages 6 months and older.

But the recent FDA approval limits the shots for people age 65 and older and those younger who have a health condition that makes them high-risk for a serious case of COVID-19.

Doctors and pharmacists say they still expect many people to qualify for the shots because the list of conditions that would make someone high-risk is long. It includes ex-smokers and people who are physically inactive.

And pharmacists will mostly rely on the patient’s word that they have a condition that makes them eligible for a shot.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.