"Opinion This Is Why Nursing Homes Failed So Badly"

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Opinion
This Is Why Nursing Homes Failed So Badly
The first coronavirus outbreak in the United States happened in a nursing home in February. Since then, it’s only gotten worse.
By E. Tammy Kim Contributing Opinion Writer Dec. 31, 2020

... The facility hadn’t yet received its shipment of vaccines, but Danielle, who called herself a “usually pro-vaccine person,” told me that she and most of her co-workers weren’t planning to get the shot. Scientists agree that the vaccines are safe and well worth the risk, but it’s easy to understand Danielle’s mistrust. After all the death she’s witnessed, she doesn’t believe that pharmaceutical companies or the government or her bosses have suddenly come to value caregivers’ lives.

... The facility hadn’t yet received its shipment of vaccines, but Danielle, who called herself a “usually pro-vaccine person,” told me that she and most of her co-workers weren’t planning to get the shot. Scientists agree that the vaccines are safe and well worth the risk, but it’s easy to understand Danielle’s mistrust. After all the death she’s witnessed, she doesn’t believe that pharmaceutical companies or the government or her bosses have suddenly come to value caregivers’ lives.

“When you're exposed to patients,” Akhter said, “and when you're exposing yourself to other patients whom you can potentially infect, to say... ‘I'm going to hold off on getting a vaccine,’ is a very aggressive measure. Sometimes there are reasonable reasons for it, but by and large — by and large for people, especially in health care, to not be getting vaccinated, it is a little bit hard to comprehend.”