‘I was very happy,’ said Vega, ‘but at the same time, we in color communities did our own advocacy, because if we did not do our own advocacy, we would not even have a [vaccination] location. ”
Chelsea is 67 percent Latino and almost half of its residents are immigrants. Many of them are undocumented, work low wages and live in crowded apartments. Virus figures in Chelsea are consistently among the highest in the state.
Since the onset of the outbreak, Vega’s small non-profit organization has weakened its response to the twin health and economic crises in Chelsea, spreading thousands of meals to struggling families through its food pantry each week and now also helping to immunize the community.
“We are exhausted in the city of Chelsea,” said Dinanyili Paulino, chief operating officer of La Colaborativa. ‘We have said a lot: why do you focus on white neighborhoods and not [hard-hit communities]? ”
The La Colaborativa location at Broadway 318 will open Thursday after several months of extensive renovations done pro bono by local painters and carpenters’ unions. When La Colaborativa launched its food pantry last spring to feed non-working residents, the need was so great that the floors were washed away by foot traffic, Paulino said. In July, they had to move the pantry to a warehouse on 6th Street while the office was doing repairs.
Workers installed more worksheets in the office kitchen on Wednesday, Paulino said as East Boston Neighborhood Health Center staff prepared the vaccination room.
“We wanted to be where people are, and there is no better place than Broadway and Bellingham Square,” said Manny Lopes, chief executive of East Boston Neighborhood Health Center, about partnering with La Colaborativa to offer an injection site. “This is the most important place in Chelsea that people know, understand and recognize.”
Jessica Rinaldi / Globe Staff
East Boston Neighborhood Health Center last Thursday reached out to La Colaborativa – formerly known as the Chelsea Collaborative – over the opening of a vaccination site that would be publicly accessible to the public. Vega was more than happy to hand over the keys. The office – which is deceptively large despite its appearance – will eventually have the capacity to vaccinate as many as 500 people a day, Lopes said, depending on the state’s staff and vaccine supply. The health center has initially planned about 100 appointments for Thursday, with some vacancies.
Governor Charlie Baker, in comments Wednesday and earlier, defended his administration’s handling of the implementation, promising to do more to provide the vaccine to color communities.
“This is, of course, an ongoing process and we are also working to add more sites in some communities that have been particularly hard hit by COVID,” Baker said at the Fenway Park Mass Vaccination Center.
He said the state is working with local boards of health, community health centers and pharmacies on a variety of strategies “to ensure we cover more land here in Massachusetts” to distribute the vaccine. According to Baker, there are now about 125 vaccination sites that are expected to open by mid-February, including another 30 at pharmacies, many of which are affected in communities outside COVID-19, he said.
The vaccination site at La Colaborativa is at least the fourth in Chelsea, and the largest for the public. On Monday, the Walgreens on Broadway began administering vaccines to residents 75 and older, first responders and health workers. Vaccinations also begin Thursday for eligible patients from Beth Israel Deaconess HealthCare in Chelsea. Peter Shorett, chief integration officer at Beth Israel Lahey Health, said the Chelsea Clinic, which opens in the Parkway Plaza shopping center, will start vaccinating 100 patients a day before rising to 300 next week. is booked until 12 February.
According to City Manager Thomas Ambrosino, Chelsea are also set to launch a mobile vaccination program, which is expected to launch in low-income senior housing on Friday. People 75 years and older are currently eligible for the vaccine.
“We are pretty well able to handle this small population that is currently eligible for the vaccine,” Ambrosino said. “When the fitness in phase 2 starts to expand significantly, we will need a few extra sites to meet the need, but at the moment I feel pretty confident that we can handle the 75-plus.”
Chelsea’s ability to vaccinate its residents will be tested because the state is eligible for essential workers in phase 2. According to an analysis by the American Civil Liberties Union in Massachusetts, 80 percent of Chelsea’s population are employed in occupations – such as construction, food preparation, transportation and maintenance of buildings – deemed necessary amid the pandemic.
But many in Chelsea believe the workers are not being prioritized under Baker’s distribution plan, following his announcement last week that people aged 65 and older will move in front of the essential workers in Phase 2.
Black people and Latinos in Massachusetts remain much under vaccinated compared to white residents. According to the state Department of Public Health, as of Jan. 26, 43 percent of people who have been fully vaccinated are white. Meanwhile, just under 4 percent of those who received both doses are Asians, more than three percent Latin, and less than three percent black. The state’s vaccination data on race and ethnicity are incomplete due to inconsistent reporting by vaccinators, which is why these figures are not 100 percent.
City councilor Damali Vidot said Baker should have put vaccinations in Chelsea first.
“We need more thoughtful leadership from above,” she said. The state’s mass vaccination at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough ‘is ideal for football matches’, she continued, but’ what about people who do not have vehicles? What about people who are less affluent? Don’t have internet? Not sure how to use a computer? We think in a very privileged, classicist way. LEAK exposed inequalities Governor Baker refused to see it. ”
Matt Stout of the Globe staff contributed to this story.
Deanna Pan can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @DDpan. Stephanie Ebbert can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @StephanieEbbert.