Hartford HealthCare Closing Mega Vaccine Sites

By Ciara Hooks, The Bristol Press

July 1, 2021

During a press conference Wednesday morning Hartford HealthCare announced the closing of their mega vaccine sites.

“This is a monumental moment in time. We’re turning the page to the final chapter,” said Jeffrey A. Flaks, President & CEO, Hartford HealthCare. “We think back to being here in March of 2020 when we first stood up our testing location here in the Convention Center. Then shortly after a field hospital right above us. And then this past December of 2020 we stood up our first vaccine center here. The Convention Center has been an incredible partner; its’ been an incredible location changing people’s lives across the community; it’s really immeasurable.”

This week while Hartford HealthCare will be closing the mega sites first opened on December 29, they will also be administering their 500,000th vaccine.

“We were doing north of 1,600 plus shots a day for vaccines here and to now be in this moment today, we’re really breaking down this center,” said Flaks. “It signifies an enormous moment in progress and our community defeating this virus.”

Everyone worked together from the nurses to the administrative people down to the Convention center staff.

“On December 28, 2020, I along with my team walked through the door. We really didn’t know what to expect. I mean we were all nurses we knew how to give vaccinations we’ve been doing it right along, but this was different. So, we really didn’t know what to expect. And then our first client walked through the door and it all just came together,” said Karen Pagliaro, RN, Hartford HealthCare. “Each person (client) brought in their own story and some people came in really excited and then there were others who were nervous and sad.”

Hartford HealthCare has done now more than 1.2 million covid-19 tests.

“These aren’t statistics these are people, these are human beings, these are lives we’ve touched and I am grateful to my colleagues the people who have stepped forward their courage their bravery and the way they’ve partnered with our community,” said Flaks.

The system is moving from the large locations to now developing a community approach to where they are going to connect with each person through the community partnerships and alliances they have created.

“We’ve sent our mobile health teams out more than 2,000 times. And we have recognized that this is a permanent solution; this is about improving health equity this is about improving to ensure no person no community will be left behind,” said Flaks.

James Cardon, MD, Chief Clinical Integration Officer, Hartford HealthCare said that this isn’t the ending but a transition.

“We knew this day would be coming that we would not need these large sites to vaccinate folks. That doesn’t mean our work is done. We have more vaccines to administer. We are migrating to more distributed smaller sites,” said Cardon.

Hartford HealthCare has 17 sites across their footprint and all of them available for walk in.

“We’re excited about the future we think we’re coming out of this better than when we went in much better opportunity to care for the communities that we serve and really give them that personalized coordinated care we’re committed to,” said Cardon.

Keith Grant, APRN and Senior System Director of Infection Prevention, Hartford HealthCare says one of the most important pieces of this is how effective the vaccine is a question that is asked a lot.

“I think the best data the best study we’re seeing is about 88% efficacy from Pfizer and Moderna. I normally put Pfizer and Moderna together because theoretically they’re the same exact vaccines and technology and Johnson&Johhnson did their study as well their review they’re a small study but showed equally as effective. So, we do have very effective vaccines,” he said.