Staff and residents will begin receiving vaccinations Tuesday at the site of one of the nation’s worst coronavirus outbreaks in a long-term care facility.COVID-19 is blamed for the spring deaths of 76 veterans who lived at the Holyoke Soldiers’ Home. Additionally, a resident of the home who had lived at an off-site skilled nursing facility since April died earlier this month.Air Force veteran Robert Aucoin received the first inoculation for the virus at the facility Tuesday morning. Aucoin, who has lived at the state-run home since 2018, served from 1961 to 1965 and during his service worked as the control tower operator at Pope Air Force Base in North Carolina.Two former top administrators at the Holyoke home have pleaded not guilty to criminal negligence charges connected to the deaths.The doses that will be given starting Tuesday come from the state’s second shipment of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and will be injected by CVS pharmacists.”We encourage as many staff and residents as possible to get vaccinated,” Interim Superintendent Michael Lazo wrote in a memo obtained by 5 Investigates last week.Shots are also due to be given Tuesday at the state’s other Soldiers’ Home, in Chelsea. Army veteran Dominic Pitella is expected to get the first shot there. Pitella, a former cook with the 559th Air Service Group, served in the Pacific Theater during World War II in 1945. He has lived at the home since 2018.The vaccinations are part of a statewide effort to innoculate residents and staff at long-term care facilities, which began Monday. Nancy Vecchione Colonero, a 103-year-old resident of the Beaumont Rehabilitation and Skilled Nursing Center in Westborough, was one of the first people to get the first dose of the inoculation. She called it a privilege. Shirley Nolan, a retired teacher who lives at the Benjamin Healthcare Center in Boston’s Mission Hill neighborhood, said Hallelujah after she got the vaccine.
HOLYOKE, Mass. —
Staff and residents will begin receiving vaccinations Tuesday at the site of one of the nation’s worst coronavirus outbreaks in a long-term care facility.
COVID-19 is blamed for the spring deaths of 76 veterans who lived at the Holyoke Soldiers’ Home. Additionally, a resident of the home who had lived at an off-site skilled nursing facility since April died earlier this month.
Air Force veteran Robert Aucoin received the first inoculation for the virus at the facility Tuesday morning.
Aucoin, who has lived at the state-run home since 2018, served from 1961 to 1965 and during his service worked as the control tower operator at Pope Air Force Base in North Carolina.
Two former top administrators at the Holyoke home have pleaded not guilty to criminal negligence charges connected to the deaths.
The doses that will be given starting Tuesday come from the state’s second shipment of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and will be injected by CVS pharmacists.
“We encourage as many staff and residents as possible to get vaccinated,” Interim Superintendent Michael Lazo wrote in a memo obtained by 5 Investigates last week.
Shots are also due to be given Tuesday at the state’s other Soldiers’ Home, in Chelsea. Army veteran Dominic Pitella is expected to get the first shot there.
Pitella, a former cook with the 559th Air Service Group, served in the Pacific Theater during World War II in 1945. He has lived at the home since 2018.
The vaccinations are part of a statewide effort to innoculate residents and staff at long-term care facilities, which began Monday.
Nancy Vecchione Colonero, a 103-year-old resident of the Beaumont Rehabilitation and Skilled Nursing Center in Westborough, was one of the first people to get the first dose of the inoculation. She called it a privilege. Shirley Nolan, a retired teacher who lives at the Benjamin Healthcare Center in Boston’s Mission Hill neighborhood, said Hallelujah after she got the vaccine.