Charlie Baker defends reopening, showcases efforts to boost coronavirus vaccine equity
Gov. Charlie Baker showcased efforts to get coronavirus vaccines into the arms of vulnerable residents and defended his decision to push ahead with reopening the state’s economy despite pleas from public health experts and local officials to hit the “pause” button.
“We recognize that COVID has not affected every community the same way, and communities of color have been the hardest hit,” Baker said, speaking at the Morning Star Baptist Church in Mattapan on Monday.
The church is now doubling as a vaccination clinic — one of five sites Boston Medical Center is operating in hard-hit Boston communities in partnership with neighborhood health clinics.
Senior Pastor Bishop John M. Borders III said Morningstar should serve as a “model” for churches and health clinics around the state and show communities “you can trust these institutions, and you can trust this vaccination.”
State Rep. Russell Holmes, a Mattapan Democrat, said institutions like Morningstar will be “critical” to making inroads in communities of color like his, where mistrust in government and in health systems is rampant.
“We recognize there’s a hesitancy around the vaccine and much of this hesitancy is born of generations of systemic racism and disproportionate access to quality medical care in Black and brown communities,” Baker said.
To date, Massachusetts has received about 2 million doses of vaccine, and administered about 1.7 million shots into arms. About 90% of long-term care residents and 70% of staff have been vaccinated, as have 68% of people 75 and older. Baker said the community vaccination sites opening now are an effort to make the vaccine even more accessible to the state’s vulnerable residents in communities of color.
The Republican governor was left defending his decision to further reopen businesses on Monday and setting up an additional reopening later in March for sports stadiums.
“We felt — based on that data and the success of the vaccine rollout so far — that it was appropriate to make some adjustments,” Baker said.
Administration officials are looking at the data “every day” and the Baker said, “if we see stuff in the data that concerns us, we’ll make adjustments again.”
But Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky doubled down on her pleas to governors like Baker to resist relaxing restrictions.
“Please hear me clearly: At this level of cases, with variants spreading, we stand to completely lose the hard-earned ground we have gained,” Walensky said, building on similar comments she made on Friday.
In a Sunday letter, Rep. William Driscoll, D-Milton, who co-chairs the Legislature’s Joint Committee on COVID-19, urged the governor to “pause” reopening in accordance with public health experts’ recommendations.
from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/302uAhZ
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