Health

4 HE ALTH • Spring 2022 Health Care Br iefs Gov. Baker signs off on $101M COVID-19 response bill Massachusetts will steer another $101 million toward its COVID-19 response under a spending bill Gov. Charlie Baker signed over the weekend that also shifts the statewide primary election date up to Sept. 6. Baker on Saturday approved all of the spending on COVID-19 emergency paid sick leave, rapid tests, high-quali- ty masks and vaccine access that law- makers included in the supplemental budget (H 4430). He vetoed two outside policy sec- tions and returned another two, including an attempt by the Legislature to codify a vaccine equity plan, with amendments. The new law calls for $76 million in direct state spending aimed at boost- ing access to masks, COVID-19 vac- cines and rapid tests, particularly for schools, congregate care facilities and homeless shelters. It also allots another $25 million in available federal funds to the state's COVID emergency paid sick leave program. Baker struck down two outside sec- tions that he said together would have required the state Department of Public Health to "issue and post guid- ance on mask usage and testing, quar- antining, and isolation periods related to COVID-19 within 30 days." The department already works to publish up-to-date guidance, Baker said, arguing the additional language in the bill would "serve no purpose if signed into law." O n Feb. 28, nurses at Saint Vincent Hospital in Worcester voted 302 to 133 against a decertification effort of their membership in the Massachusetts Nurses Association union. The in-favor vote means nurses will remain unionized and represented by MNA, according to the announcement from the union. The MNA represented the nurses throughout the nearly 10-month strike and contract negotia- tions with Saint Vincent Hospital and its Texas-based parent Tenet Healthcare Corp. Days after the union and hospital reached a tentative agreement to end the strike in mid-December, a group of U Mass alumni Dan and Diane Casey Riccio have pledged $15 million to UMass Chan Medical School in Worcester to support ALS and neuroscience research, the school announced Feb. 3. Of the $15 million, $10 million will be set aside for the Riccio ALS Accelerator Initiative and $5 million will be used to expand and endow the Riccio Fund for Neuroscience. Dan Riccio serves as vice president of engineering at Apple, Inc. and graduated from UMass Amherst with an undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering in 1986. Diane Riccio received her doctorate from UMass' Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in 2003 and works with the Alzheimer's Association of Northern California and Northern Nevada, where she serves on the board of directors, according to UMass. The pair have donated to the school twice before, and, as a result, have developed on an ongoing relationship with the school's chancellor, Dr. Michael Collins. "Dan has been a visionary leader for a long time and he said if there is something you really need, I wish you would think about that and let me know," Collins said. That offer turned into a conversation about ALS and neuroscience research, which Collins said the Riccios are particularly keen on supporting. While the gift, itself, did not come as a complete surprise, the dollar amount did. Collins said such funding provides a boost of confidence in the research the school is conducting. When asked whether the gift would help create jobs at the school, Collins said research, including into a cure for ALS, was the priority. "These gifts aren't about job creation, they're about science creation," Collins said. This pledge is the third and largest gift the Riccios have pledged to the UMass Chan school. In 2013, they gave $1 million to the UMass ALS Cellucci Fund, and in 2017, they gave $1 million to establish the Dan and Diane Riccio Fund for Neuroscience as well as an additional $1 million to support the Cellucci Fund. This is the largest gift UMass Chan has received since the school received $175 million from The Morningside Foundation last summer. That gift prompted the school to change its name from UMass Medical School to UMass Chan Medical School, in recognition of the foundation's founders, the Chan family of Hong Kong. Saint Vincent nurses vote to stay with MNA union nurses launched an effort to decertify the MNA. The effort was led by Richard Avola, who was hired during the strike as a permanent replacement nurse, and the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, a Virginia- based nonprofit focused on eliminating union power. Striking nurses voted to ratify the contract, which included staffing improvements and allowed all striking nurses to return to their previous posi- tions, on Jan. 3. A month later, nurses received bal- lots to vote on the decertification of the Massachusetts Nurses Association and the union. Saint Vincent said in a state- ment it will respect the decision. One section Baker returned to law- makers with an amendment called for the secretary of health and human ser- vices to craft and implement a COVID- 19 vaccination equity plan with a goal of eliminating disparities in vaccina- tion rates within 120 days. Baker's amendment strikes the 120- day target, a change that he said would "ref lect the continuing challenge faced by nearly every country in the world and every state in the country of achieving total vaccine equity." The Republican governor defended his administration's work to make vac- cines are available and accessible across Massachusetts, recounting steps the administration took such as prioritiz- ing 20 hard-hit cities and towns -- in which 12 have rates of residents with one vaccine dose above the national average, according to Baker -- and steering additional funding to commu- nity organizations. "Our administration is committed to continuing our efforts to reduce dispar- ities in vaccination rates in Massachusetts," Baker wrote. I n n o v a t i o n UMass Chan receives $15M gift for ALS, neuroscience research H H Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker

• Cover