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Taking Our Shot: COVID-19 Vaccinations Start at the Center
TAKING OUR SHOT
As 2020 drew to a close, the Center’s fight to take care of each other and our community during the COVID-19 pandemic crossed an emotional milestone as the first vaccines were administered to frontline workers. The message moving forward:
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Get vaccinated when it’s your turn.
Just after 9 a.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 29, 2020, Co-Director of Health Services Dr. Ward Carpenter administered the Center’s first dose of COVID-19 vaccine into the arm of frontline health care staffer Keith Leach.
“I’m extremely hopeful that we are on the path to end the pandemic,” said Leach, a quality coordinator with the Center’s Health Services department. “As a Black man living in America, I have seen my community disproportionately impacted by COVID-19. I know firsthand just how dangerous COVID-19 can be—people whom I care about have been affected by the virus and it’s hit very close to home. I knew I needed to get the vaccine to protect myself and, hopefully, to show others that they should do the same. Getting vaccinated is essential to our wellbeing and our future.”
Starting with Leach and following requirements set by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, the Center administered its first batch of 400 Moderna vaccines to frontline workers, including Health Services staff members and the Security and Facilities workers who support the Center’s various health care sites.
“This is a pivotal time for us to help combat the deadly surge of COVID-19 cases in Los Angeles and beyond. Since the pandemic began, our dedicated frontline workers helped to keep our Center open for those in our community who rely on us. This vaccine will help us in that fight,” said Carpenter. “I strongly encourage everyone to educate themselves and consider taking the vaccine—when given the opportunity—because it is the only way to defeat this highly-contagious virus, to save lives, and to bring normalcy and joy back to our lives.”
For many of the Center’s frontline workers, getting vaccinated was an emotional milestone in the fight against COVID-19. Health Services Compliance Coordinator Alejandra Galindo had fought the disease alongside her 79-year-old mother earlier in the year. Her sister-in-law passed away from the virus.
“These nine months have been scary and hard. Having COVID-19 was a horrible experience,” Galindo said. “Getting this vaccine will help keep us safe.”
Just days before he got vaccinated at the Center, Health Services Senior Program Manager David Flores lost a close friend from high school to the infectious disease.
“He was the first thing I thought about, and there’s some guilt because I’m being afforded this opportunity that he wasn’t,” Flores said tearfully after being vaccinated. “I’m grateful
to the Center for the expeditious manner in which these vaccines have been rolled out to cover frontline staff who are serving our community.”
Health Services Manager of Integrated Care Linda Santiman had been praying for the vaccine.
“In our lifetimes, we’ve never seen anything as dire or as lethal as this, and I know this is a part of how we’re going to heal,” said Santiman, who started at the Center as an HIV counselor 14 years ago. “Getting vaccinated is a way to honor everyone, the first responders, and everyone we’ve lost.”
By February, based on vaccine availability and Los Angeles County Department of Public Health’s eligibility guidelines, the Center was able to start vaccinating Health Services clients who were at least 65 years old.
“I came here to get vaccinated because this is where my doctor is, it is a familiar place. The safety of it felt good to me,” said Roger Burnley, who has been receiving health care at the Center for more than a decade. “I don’t want to take a chance of anyone getting this, and this first vaccine shot is going to give me a sense of protection. After I’m fully immunized, I’m going to feel much more freedom.”
As a community health clinic, the Center is uniquely positioned to reach LGBTQ people who have been disenfranchised by the medical community and, at the same time, disproportionally impacted by COVID-19. A recent study report from the CDC found that the underlying health conditions which increase the risk for more severe COVID-19-related illness are more prevalent among LGBTQ people. Black and Latinx communities were found to be especially vulnerable.
“We are in a unique position to be able to get vaccines out efficiently to people who need them the most,” said Center Chief Medical Officer Dr. Robert Bolan. “We’re the best poised to reach into communities that have been disadvantaged, who are suspicious about the vaccine’s efficacy, worried about discrimination, and that don’t want to show up at a vaccine place where nobody looks like them.”
As more vaccines become available, education about its efficacy, along with myth-busting, is an important part of the Center’s ongoing work.
Ace Seidel, an intern counselor with Mental Health Services, described the vaccine as “the ticket. It’s the key to getting our lives back—to being able to see our families and hug our loved ones. It’s our road to freedom.”
Steven Valladarez had been nervous about getting vaccinated but thought of his grandparents who are both battling COVID-19.
“You hear all these myths about the vaccine, but they are not facts,” said Valladarez, a housing navigator for the Center’s Stop Violence program. “The Center was able to provide us with a fact sheet that helped ease my mind. Do your research on facts, not myths. This is a pandemic and a health crisis. Knowing there’s a vaccine that’s available, I think we should jump on board.”
Epidemiology assistant Ryan Assaf, whose two brothers are emergency room doctors, gave this advice after being vaccinated: “Don’t fear the vaccine. It’s here to help you—it’s not here to hurt you. The benefit of the vaccine will always outweigh the risks of getting the virus itself.”
“While some of us may be uneasy about receiving the vaccine, it is our only way back to the life we all remember: spending time with extended family to working side-by-side, hugs, and to so many other things that make life worth living. This is our chance,” said Dr. Carpenter.
Triangle Square Residents Receive COVID-19 Vaccine and Hope for the Future
When Edward Stanza’s medical provider offered him an opportunity to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, he turned it down because they couldn’t give a dose to his husband David Quinte.
“Even though I have an immune deficiency issue, I wanted David to have it at the same time,” said Stanza. “After 38 years
together, it wouldn’t have been fair. One getting vaccinated, and not the other, was not an option for us.”
The opportunity came just two weeks later when the couple was among the residents of Triangle Square, the Center’s affordable housing complex in Hollywood, to receive the first dose of the vaccine through a program administered by Walgreens.
“The most fearful thing is we know couples where one died from COVID-19 and the other lived,” Quinte shared. “It’s scary and very hard to think about—the fear of catching it and then giving it.”
Quinte, 72, has left their apartment only for doctor and dentist appointments while Stanza, a decade younger, has been running any necessary errands.
After they receive their second vaccine doses, the pair hopes to regain some sense of normalcy which, until 11 months ago, included daily walks.
“I’m happy because now I’m closer to the point where I can go outside, walk again, and have some exercise each day. I’m missing that,” said Quinte. “We would do 3–4
miles a day because this is a great walking area here in the Hollywood neighborhood. Since COVID-19, no more walking, no more anything. So, needless to say, we’ve both gained some weight.”
Fellow Triangle Square resident Maria Cibario has also been hunkering down since March a year ago, emerging only to go grocery shopping which she does in the early morning hours.
“I feel wonderful, elated, and grateful,” says Cibario, who was the first resident to become vaccinated by the Walgreens team. “It’s been stressful for the whole country and—worst of all—for us seniors. We know if we get sick, there’s very little they can do. We [may] have conditions that make it harder to get well quickly.”
Frank McClane describes himself as “grateful and relieved” to have had the opportunity to be vaccinated at Triangle Square.
“I am thankful to the Center’s Senior Services for applying and procuring a place in a congested system to have made this program possible,” he said. “The sense of relief, well-being, and peace of mind they have made possible as the world struggles to address this pandemic, I will never take for granted.”
Some of the vaccinated seniors said they hope people afraid of being vaccinated will work through their fears and get their shots as soon as they become available.
“Follow the science,” said Cibario. “Please get vaccinated when you have the opportunity. Do so as soon as possible. And after you get vaccinated, do not go back to your old way of life. Still remain socially distanced and safe. Just because you get the vaccine, it does not mean you can start to party down.”
After getting her vaccine, Barbara Boyce looked back to when she was a small child and afraid of another life-threatening health threat.
“I’m old enough to remember the polio vaccine,” she said. “It’s like, ‘Yeah, give me that vaccine so I don’t get sick!’ Polio was scary because you couldn’t go to swimming pools and do a lot of stuff in the summer because you couldn’t have people around.”
For Stanza, the vaccines are the only way the world can get past the pandemic.
“If we’re able to vaccinate enough of us, the virus cannot be passed on by us,” he pointed out. “It’s like the HIV virus: you can’t pass it if you make an effort not to pass it. And the vaccination is it right now. As a survivor of HIV, I know what it’s like. You take a pill to keep the virus down in your blood system. In this case, take a shot. It’s going to take all of us vaccinating to keep us alive.”
