“UPMC is ready to vaccinate our communities” — this headline of the email I received last week suggests a much different UPMC than the one I experienced recently. I am a UPMC patient and insurance holder. After securing an appointment for a COVID-19 vaccination, I arrived at a UPMC facility only to be told that I could not get my second shot there because I had gotten my first shot elsewhere — in California, where I have no plans to return.
“It’s our policy,” they said. So, even though our country is trying to resolve a public health crisis, UPMC has doses of vaccine it throws away every day, and I am a member of the community UPMC purports to be “ready to vaccinate,” I was turned away. Tell me, UPMC, are you in the business of care or not? Sadly, I think we both know the answer.
NELLE CREADY
Mount Washington
First Published: April 30, 2021, 4:00 a.m.