MONTREAL -- Parents of children at a Cote-St-Luc elementary school are asking to receive COVID-19 vaccines, saying they don't understand why they were left out of a pilot project in the area.

The parents of kids who attend Merton Elementary have started an online petition addressed to Mylene Drouin, the head of Montreal Public Health, as well as the head of the regional health authority.

In it, they said the believe the regional health authority made an oversight by excluding Merton from the pilot project, which is aimed at containing COVID-19 variants in the Cote-St-Luc area.

According to the petition, Merton is the only elementary school in Cote-St-Luc that wasn't included, even though most of the families live in the postal code region that has been identified as a hot spot.

The parents also claim that Merton has recently had a COVID-variant outbreak that required the closure of four classrooms.

A spokesperson for the health authority said the doses earmarked for the project were limited to 15,000 and the schools involved were chosen based on epidemiological data.

Thus far, over 800 people have signed the petition.