Miami taking COVID vaccines to city’s Black seniors. Officials hope to expand reach.
Claudette Hammonds leaned back in her chair as she said her COVID-19 vaccination shot was painless.
“I did not feel it, honey. That’s what’s so amazing,” she said Wednesday morning. “It was wham, bam, boom, and that was it. Didn’t feel it at all. It was a quick process.”
The 67-year-old, wearing a T-shirt that read, “Sorry I can’t. I’m social distancing,” sat in a rattan chair in the courtyard of her Liberty City apartment building, a pleasant and shady space that’s remained empty since the pandemic ended social gatherings and group activities.
Hammonds lives in a community for people 55 years or older called Tuscany Cove on Northwest Seventh Avenue. Hours before, she’d been one of the first residents to receive her first COVID vaccination under a collaborative program between city administrators and Commissioner Jeffrey Watson, the elected official who represents Miami’s majority-Black District 5.
City officials directed about 300 vaccines to Tuscany Cove to set up a pod, a vaccination site restricted to a certain population that is eligible for the shot under Gov. Ron DeSantis’ orders. Watson said the city is hoping to set up similar sites at other senior facilities in the coming weeks, and perhaps a mass vaccination site at Charles Hadley Park to give the community easier access to vaccines.
The missing piece of the plan: Enough doses of vaccine.
“We’re all doing this on the fly because we don’t control the product,” Watson said.
Wednesday morning, Mayor Francis Suarez said he had not received an assurance from Tallahassee officials that more doses were on the way to keep meeting demand among the city’s senior centers. He said he’s particularly concerned with Miami’s Black communities, who have not received shots at the same rate as other racial and ethnic groups.
In effort to vaccinate Black Miamians, religious leaders, community groups step up
Local political leaders are trying to tackle racial disparities in the vaccine rollout in a few ways. One is to partner with religious leaders and community groups to vaccinate seniors. Another is to go directly to senior living facilities like Tuscany Cove and offer inoculations in the building’s community room.
Watson described the city’s efforts to get shots in arms as an “imperfect time with imperfect solutions,” saying the city’s fire-rescue workers are doing the best they can to provide a limited supply of vaccine to senior residents who want them.
Uncertainty around the number of doses the state will continue to deliver is compounded by mistrust of medical institutions — a fear fueled by past racist and sometimes unethical medical research practices. Watson cited the Tuskegee experiment, when officials studied the effects of untreated syphilis on hundreds of Black men without their consent.
Recognizing the reluctance, Watson asked the community to consider this a “new day.” He encouraged people to discuss the vaccine within their inner circles and make arrangements once they feel comfortable.
“Some people want to talk to their doctor. They should, in a hurry,” Watson said. “Some people want to talk to their religious counsel. They should, in a hurry. People want to wait and talk to their family members. They should, in a hurry.”
Watson later told the Herald his office is coordinating stops at two Overtown senior living apartments, Jack Orr Plaza and Lummus Park Manor, in the coming days. Some local churches are also getting cleared to act as distribution sites. For those inside Miami city limits who live in Watson’s district, the commissioner’s office number is 305-250-5390.
The discussion among Hammonds and her neighbors is nuanced. Hammonds said even though she knows the history of inequity and lack of access to quality healthcare for Black communities, she said she believed getting the shot was the right move for her. The convenience of a popup vaccination site inside her building also made a difference.
“This is a new thing for us, so we’re not so gung-ho,” Hammonds said. “But I took it because I believe in science, and I think it’s a good thing. And another thing: I couldn’t be able to stand in those lines so with them bringing it here to the community, it was a great thing.”
Mary Washington, one of Hammonds’ friends, said she’s not planning on getting vaccinated because she feels the trials were rushed and she doesn’t feel confident that side effects are fully understood. She cited more than 20 deaths among elderly Norwegians who recently received the vaccine as a source for her concern.
“This is why people are skeptical,” she said.
A Reuters report found the deaths in Norway, covered by multiple mainstream media outlets, require context. Norwegian health and government officials said the deaths occurred among the most elderly and frail nursing home residents. On average, about 400 people die each week in such facilities in Norway. Authorities said that after investigating 13 of 23 deaths, they had not concluded that vaccinations were to blame.
Despite some skepticism, there is still a demand. By noon Wednesday, about 100 people had received their first doses at Tuscany Cove. Watson and Suarez both said they hope to receive enough vaccines from the state to launch vaccinations at Hadley Park, which served as a COVID-19 testing site for several months in 2020.
