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Advocacy Covid-19 News

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Documenting Our Disability History My name is Sandy Novack, and I have served on the Disability Policy Consortium Board of Directors since 2018.  I am also the Chair of the Board’s Advocacy Committee. Last month, at the DPC annual awards event, I announced a history project that DPC plans to offer for people with disabilities […]

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Covid-19 Facilities News Spotlight

2023-11-14 Spotlight: Fire Thru Dry Grass

October 30, 2023 (premiere)[90-minute documentary aired on PBS] Wearing snapback caps and Air Jordans, the Reality Poets aren’t typical nursing home residents. In Fire Through Dry Grass, these young, Black and brown disabled artists document their lives on lockdown during Covid, their rhymes underscoring the danger and imprisonment they feel. In the face of institutional […]

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Covid-19 Facilities News Spotlight

2023-08-21 Spotlight: How Nursing Homes Failed to Protect Residents from Covid

By Paula Span, New York Times (free access), August 19, 2023 The first terrifying wave of Covid-19 caused 60,000 deaths among residents of nursing homes and other long-term care facilities within five months. As the pandemic wore on, medical guidelines called for promptly administering newly approved antiviral treatments to infected patients at high risk of […]

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Covid-19 Facilities News Testimony Worker Support

DPH Proposed Regulations Eliminating COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate for Personnel

(Scroll down to read DignityMA testimony for this proposal.) The Massachusetts Department of Public Health has issued proposed amendments to regulations for long term care facilities and other providers aligning the flu and COVID-19 vaccine requirements for personnel, eliminating the mandate that all personnel be vaccinated with COVID-19 vaccine.  Under the proposed amendments, personnel will […]

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Covid-19 News Policy

Open Letter from DignityMA regarding Masking, Patient Safety, and Trust

The following two letters were sent to Health System Leaders in Massachusetts, on the occasion of suspending masking requirements and covid protections in health care settings. Download the two letters, or read below from May 10, 2023 Open Letter on Masking, Patient Safety and Trust A call to suspend any end to universal masking and […]

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Covid-19 Facilities Holyoke Soldiers' Home News Spotlight

2023-05-01 Spotlight: Comm. v. Clinton – MA Supreme Court re: Holyoke Soldiers’ Home

SJC reinstates criminal charges against managers of Holyoke Soldiers’ Home, where 76 died early in pandemicBoston Globe, April 27, 2023By Ivy Scott and John R. Ellement Families of the veterans say the decision offers ‘a glimmer of hope’ as they prepare for the upcoming trial.The state’s highest court reinstated criminal charges on Thursday against Bennett […]

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Covid-19 Facilities Holyoke Soldiers' Home News Spotlight

2023-03-20 Spotlight: Everyone in a nursing home deserves a single room

The government should require that owners give residents private space — or it should take over the facilities and replace them with small homes. [Editor’s note: Margaret Morganroth Gullette, resident scholar in the Women’s Studies Research Center at Brandeis University, is the author of “Ending Ageism, or How Not to Shoot Old People.” Her forthcoming […]

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Covid-19 News

Equity must be driving force of ongoing Mass. public health policy

Letter to the Boston Globe, February 14, 2023, by Dr. Lara Jirmanus, Carlene Pavlos and Paul Lanzikos Regarding “The White House wants to end the public health emergency. Is the country prepared?” (Editorial, Feb. 9), we should ask, “Is the Commonwealth prepared?” How our elected leaders answer that question will tell us whether they are […]

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Covid-19 Facilities News

BU Alum Calls for a COVID Day of Remembrance in Massachusetts

Bostonia, October 31, 2022 Paul Lanzikos (Questrom’80), cofounder of Dignity Alliance Massachusetts, says the occasion could have public health benefits.It’s estimated that more than one million Americans have died of COVID since 2020, according to Our World in Data, and across the nation, grieving families of COVID-19 victims are demanding the designation of an annual […]

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Advocacy Covid-19 Facilities Holyoke Soldiers' Home News Resolution

Amicus Brief re: Soldiers’ Home

Read the entire Soldiers’ Home Brief (pdf). Dignity Alliance MA has signed onto this brief. IMPOUNDED CASECOMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTSSUPREME JUDICIAL COURTHAMPDEN, SS. SJC NO. 13335APPEALS COURT NOS. 2022-P-0309, 2022-P-0321 COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS,Appellant,v.DAVID CLINTON AND BENNETT WALSH,Defendants-Appellees ON APPEAL FROM A JUDGMENT OF THE SUPERIOR COURT BRIEF OF AMICI CURIAE LONG TERM CARE COMMUNITY COALITION, DIGNITY […]