Things may get a little unruly when North Carolina moves into vaccination phases that aren’t age-limited.

Making sure people don’t skip the vaccine line is relatively easy for age. It’s all about a birthdate. However, Gov. Roy Cooper and Health and Human Services Secretary Mandy Cohen effectively said Wednesday there are no mechanisms in place to prevent people from accidentally or purposely skipping the line once things move to occupations

Teachers and child care workers will be able to receive COVID-19 vaccines Feb. 24. Then, March 10, other frontline workers will join the list of people who can receive a vaccine.

But what’s a frontline essential worker? And how do you know whether you fall in the group that becomes eligible in March?

Many could guess who might fall in the frontline group. To name several, the group includes people who work in grocery stores, in court, homeless shelters, critical manufacturing fields that make medical equipment and clergy.

How about hotel workers, news reporters, people who maintain water and wastewater treatment facilities and people who work in financial services? They are not in the upcoming group of eligible people.

Never mind nefarious line skipping, it be hard for folks to determine whether it’s their turn.

Because there’s no identification requirement people might jump at the opportunity if they want a vaccination and think there’s a window to get a shot earlier.

“Obviously, you’re gonna rely somewhat on people’s honesty,” Cooper said during a news conference.

But there are some ways the state and vaccine providers might ensure priorities are followed. Cohen said a portal will allow employers to pre-register their workers and he hinted at partnerships where employers might welcome vaccinators into their businesses. The latter might end up looking like flu shot opportunities employers host where a health department employee sets up a in a room for a few hours. Dishonesty is still possible, but public clinics like those run by the Rowan County Health Department also could add screening questions to appointment-scheduling interfaces.

For those who want to be honest, the state has set up a website for people to determine what group they fall in: yourspotyourshot.nc.gov.

For others, it’s important to know there are a limited number of vaccines available. This week, there might be up to 3,500 doses of vaccine administered to Rowan residents, but that’s still relatively few doses when compared to the more than 140,000 people who live in the county. It might be July before the state moves to group No. 5 — everyone in the general public — but there will be a vaccination available for everyone at some point.

To keep things in order, it will be critical for state and local health officials to bring more publicity to vaccine phases by spelling out included groups in easy-to-understand flyers. It’s not exactly easy to find something like that online now, particularly because vaccine phases have been changed from an approach that used numbers and letters to one that now uses only five numbers. It’s most critical to bring publicity to tools like yourspotyourshot.nc.gov, which asks a series of easy questions and spits out an easy-to-understand phase number.

Rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine has been a tale of limited supply so far, but it may turn into a story about keeping phase numbers straight.