New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Grocery employees say they feel left out of Lamont’s vaccine plan.
CT grocery workers feel slighted by new COVID vaccine plan
It was nearly a year ago when Sarah Peltier began receiving calls from customers of the Simsbury Stop & Shop who were anxious about finding food.
At the time, Gov. Ned Lamont had just sent the state into lockdown as the COVID-19 pandemic hit Connecticut, and grocery stores became the primary source for people to stock up.
Over the past year, Peltier and other grocery employees have remained on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We don’t have an opportunity to work remotely in a grocery store,” she said in a phone interview with Hearst Connecticut Media. “We were there through the entire thing.”
But they now feel slighted by Lamont’s decision this week to not prioritize frontline essential workers like themselves.
Instead, the state will take an age-based approach, starting Monday with those 55 to 64. School staff, teachers and child care professionals will also be prioritized in this next round.
“I just feel really bad that there was a light at the end of the tunnel — every time we get to the light, they move it,” said Jason Laviana, a meat cutter from Torrington, who said he felt “disillusioned” by the governor’s decision.
Laviana, a 47-year-old Type 1 diabetic, will not be able to get the vaccine until late March. But Laviana said he’s also concerned for teen-aged cashiers who come face-to-face with customers and will not be eligible until May.
“We’re the ones that have been doing this since day one. We’ve been forgotten — we’ve been pushed to the rear,” he said.
At 60 years old, Tony Vernali, who heads the deli department at a Stop & Shop in Glastonbury, would be among those eligible Monday when the state opens up the vaccine to those 55 and older. But Vernali has recently recovered from the disease, so he doesn’t plan to get the shot for several months.
Still, “maybe if I was able to get it a month ago, maybe I wouldn’t have gotten sick,” he said.
“It seems after all this time, we thought we were essential workers and were gonna get it soon … it’s all gone away,” he said. “That’s a bit of a letdown.”
Joe Jarmie, a head meat cutter at a Stop & Shop in Madison, said it was “disheartening” to see grocery store employees like him become eligible for the vaccine in New York and Massachusetts while those in Connecticut have to wait. At least for Jarmie, who is 64, he won’t have to wait much longer.
But Jarmie and Peltier said grocery employees should have been rewarded for working throughout the pandemic in this environment, where they say customers often ignore the COVID rules like one-way aisles and are sometimes reluctant to wear masks.
“Give them some sense of peace of mind. That’s what we were promised,” Peltier said.
“We’re the poor stepchild that isn’t really invited to the table yet.”