OUR MEMBERS
Frontline Vaccinations Commence Healthcare workers are rolling up their sleeves to defeat COVID-19.
Millions of Bandaided biceps signal a return to normalcy: the COVID-19 vaccine rollout is under way. As this magazine goes to press, healthcare workers across the United States are getting vaccinated, and among them are hundreds of thousands of 1199SEIU members. From South Florida to Northern New York State, COVID-19 vaccines are being administered to workers in homecare agencies, hospitals, nursing homes, and retail drug outlets. “I was not at all nervous about getting vaccinated,” says Carlos Villalba, a clerk at a midtown Manhattan Rite Aid drugstore. “I was nervous about NOT getting vaccinated.” Villalba is the only member of his family currently working outside the home, and has been afraid of transmitting the virus to his parents and siblings. Carlos Rosa, a patient transporter at University of Rochester’s Strong Medical Center had similar fears. Rosa was the first healthcare worker vaccinated in Central New York’s Monroe County. Rosa was anxious to take the vaccine and thrilled when his chance to get the shot arrived. “I was surprised to be first,” says Rosa, who received his first dose of the Pfizer vaccine on Dec. 15. “I did it to show my co-workers that there was nothing wrong with the vaccine and this is how we are going to move forward as a country. Also, my father has bad asthma, and my mother is getting older. I had been staying away from them, and I missed them.”
“I am doing anything I can to encourage people to go out and get vaccinated. Unless 80% of us get vaccinated we are never going to get past this.” – Patricia O’Hara, Partners In Care Home Health Aide
Home Health Aide Patricia O’Hara is being treated for ovarian cancer, and jumped at the opportunity to get vaccinated.
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