Four leading aging services organizations this week pressed the Biden administration to prioritize certain vulnerable older Americans, such as homebound seniors and home health care workers, in the vaccination effort. 

“It is not enough to leave the allocation, access, and delivery decision-making to individual states,” the letter said. “State health departments are understandably focused on more broad scale rollout of vaccines to all older people, and soon, all adults.”

The letter suggested these actions by the Biden administration regarding homebound adults and their caregivers: “Make a public statement about the Administration’s commitment to connecting homebound older people and their caregivers to vaccines, followed by plans to activate the connection,” the letter said. “By homebound older adults we mean adults who cannot leave their homes and other older adults who would struggle to access a mass vaccination site (e.g., those dependent on oxygen, mobility limitations or moderate cognitive impairment).”

And for care workers, the letter instructed the administration: “Publicly prioritize those who work in aging services as a population of focus — similar to the announcement prioritizing teachers — and encourage states to target them in allocations and plans to administer the shots.”

Katie Smith Sloan, president and CEO, LeadingAge; James Balda, president and CEO, Argentum; David Schless, president, American Seniors Housing Association; and Mark Parkinson, president and CEO, American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living, signed the letter.

The letter, which was addressed to Cameron Webb, M.D., White House senior policy adviser for COVID-19 Equity, calls out key populations, including vulnerable older individuals who live in other types of residential settings not included in the federal Pharmacy Partnership for Long-term Care — as well as older people in community settings, such as adult day and PACE centers for whom no vaccination provisions have been made.

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