The Loretto Hospital Vaccine Scandal and the Inequality Scandals We’re Not Talking About
Loretto Hospital recently made national news after shocking revelations that a high-profile executive lined up vaccines for his favorite luxury watch store and steakhouse, as well as his Trump Tower condo building. My first reaction was: Seriously? After the last year that frontline workers and all Chicagoans have been through, these actions to put the wealthy and well-connected over workers and our elders were nothing short of shameless.
But my second reaction, unfortunately, was that I wasn’t surprised. Loretto is a safety net hospital located in Austin, staffed by workers in our union, Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Healthcare Illinois. The vast majority of SEIU hospital workers at Loretto are Black, and the West-Side community it serves in Chicago is almost entirely Black, too.
This latest controversy is just one egregious example of resources intended for Black, Brown and marginalized communities being diverted to wealthy, white communities. In this case, the resource diversion was obviously improper and has appropriately drawn widespread condemnation and scrutiny. Vaccine-related decisions of Loretto executives have life or death consequences.
But the reality is, it’s only one instance of a broader pattern of resources being systemically siphoned away from marginalized communities. In too many instances, politicians and others in power choose to divert resources from Black and Brown communities in ways that are not widely condemned — yet still have deeply detrimental life and death consequences for our communities.
Wellington Thomas has seen it first hand. As an emergency room technician at Loretto and SEIU member, he has been working on the frontlines since this deadly pandemic began. He kept showing up, even when workers didn’t have PPE or other necessary protections. But then last month, Wellington recounted how “VIPs” from outside the Austin community come to the hospital and skip the line to take vaccines out of the arms of frontline Loretto hospital workers.
And the problems aren’t limited to just one neighborhood — or even to Chicago’s city limits. For example, Illinois’ current Medicaid hospital funding formula provides more money to larger, busier hospitals, and less to smaller hospitals with lower patient volumes, even if a higher percentage of patients are on Medicaid or uninsured. The funding structure results in highly profitable hospitals in wealthy, white neighborhoods receiving more government funding than safety net hospitals in Black and brown communities. For example, Northwestern Hospital in downtown Chicago receives seven times as much Medicaid funding as Loretto, even though 84% of Loretto’s patients are insured through Medicaid compared to 20% of Northwestern’s. This is an inequality scandal that is squarely within the rules as designed, but is more harmful to Black and Brown residents of Chicago.
Our elected leaders and hospital executives cannot let vaccine distribution become yet another program infected with the racist legacies that have all too often pervaded our system. When it comes to vaccine distribution decisions, frontline workers and the communities they serve need to have a seat at the table. SEIU Healthcare provides that seat. Although vaccines offer a light at the end of the COVID tunnel, we still have a long way to go before the pandemic is over.
SEIU workers have been on the frontlines of the pandemic. They’ve sacrificed their health and lives to take care of Chicagoans over the past year, and their voices must be central to an equitable vaccine distribution. Workers cannot be ignored — they’re demanding that vaccine distribution plans include education and outreach activities that involve essential workers and our communities deeply and meaningfully, recognizing the impact of structural racism in causing trauma and heightened levels of distrust about vaccination in Black and Brown communities.
Additionally, policymakers must ensure that where you live or work doesn’t determine whether you can be vaccinated in a safe and trusted environment. For example, national retail chains like CVS and Walgreens responsible for vaccine distribution aren’t commonly found in many Black and Brown communities. Leaders must instead hold vaccine clinics in trusted neighborhood gathering spaces, like schools and churches, run by healthcare workers that reflect the communities they serve.
Recently, the Loretto board accepted the resignation of the executive responsible for organizing the unauthorized vaccine events. That’s a good first step.
But more broadly, workers are looking for hospital decision-makers, as well as state and local leaders, to take the additional steps needed to ensure that worker and community voices are heard in redressing the impact of these misappropriated vaccine doses, getting vaccines to more people, and address the longstanding disparities in healthcare access that have plagued neighborhoods like Austin for decades.
