Codman CEO Sandra Cotterell Appears on ‘Greater Boston’

As the news about the COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Massachusetts focused on inequities in availability, Community Health Centers and Boston Medical Center (BMC) were in the process of planning and implementing large-scale vaccination clinics for Boston’s communities of color. GBH TV, which has been covering the vaccine rollout, invited community leaders, including Sandra Cotterell, Codman’s CEO, to speak about the situation.

Sandra appeared on the program, Greater Boston, on March 2 with host Jim Braude and fellow community leader Bishop John Borders, III to discuss the vaccine rollout, as well as the vaccination clinics that Boston Medical Center opened in Boston neighborhoods.

The show reported that while 25% of Boston residents are Black, only 18% had received their first vaccine doses. Meanwhile, Hispanics make up 20% of the cities population and only 9% had received their first dose. Meanwhile, Whites represent 44% of Boston and 47% have received their first vaccine dose.

Cotterell and Bishop Borders spoke proudly about opening up the sites in Mattapan and Dorchester. Codman and BMC offers the vaccine at Russell Auditorium at 70 Talbot Avenue, and BMC’s site with Mattapan Community Health Center is at Morning Star Baptist Church at 1257 Blue Hill Avenue in Mattapan.

The importance of these vaccines in Boston’s hardest hit neighborhoods cannot be overstated, and is truly the key to getting to the end of this pandemic. “The quicker we get people vaccinated, the sooner we are heading in the right direction,” Cotterell explained. Borders added:”To be part of the healing process is very important.”

You can watch the episode here.