BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — The white 18-year-old who shot and killed 10 people at a Buffalo supermarket had researched the local demographics while looking for places with a high concentration of Black residents, arriving there at least a day in advance to conduct reconnaissance, law enforcement officials said Sunday.

Authorities said the gunman shot, in total, 11 Black people and two white people Saturday in a rampage motivated by racial hatred that he broadcast live.

Buffalo mass shooter’s alleged manifesto leaves no doubt attack was white supremacist terrorism

“This individual came here with the express purpose of taking as many Black lives as he could,” Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said at a news conference Sunday.

The shooter, identified as Payton Gendron, had previously threatened a shooting at his high school last June, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press. Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said the then-17-year-old was brought in for a mental health evaluation afterward.

Meanwhile, federal authorities were still working to confirm the authenticity of a racist 180-page manifesto that detailed the plot and identified Gendron by name as the gunman, the law enforcement official told the AP. But the shooting — the latest act of mass violence in a country unsettled by racial tensions, gun violence and a recent spate of hate crimes — left local residents shattered.

32-year-old Roberta Drury killed in Tops Markets mass shooting

A preliminary investigation found Gendron had repeatedly visited sites espousing white supremacist ideologies and race-based conspiracy theories and extensively researched the 2019 mosque shootings in Christchurch, New Zealand, and the man who killed dozens at a summer camp in Norway in 2011, the law enforcement official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told AP.

The manifesto posted online and purportedly written by Gendron, outlined a racist ideology rooted in a belief that the United States should belong only to white people. All others, the document said, were “replacers” who should be eliminated by force or terror. The attack was intended to intimidate all non-white, non-Christian people and get them to leave the country, it said.

Gendron had appeared on the radar of police last year after he threatened to carry out a shooting at Susquehanna High School around the time of graduation, the official said. New York State Police said troopers were called to the Conklin school on June 8, 2021, for a report that a 17-year-old student had made threatening statements.

The law enforcement official was not authorized to speak publicly on the investigation and did so on the condition of anonymity.

Gendron, confronted by police in the store’s vestibule, put a rifle to his neck but was convinced to drop it. He was arraigned later Saturday on a murder charge, appearing before a judge in a paper gown.

• The Tops Market shooter arraigned in Buffalo City Court on a charge a first-degree murder. He was put into an anti-suicide gown. (WIVB Photo/Kelsey Anderson)
• People gather outside a supermarket where several people were killed in a shooting, Saturday, May 14, 2022 in Buffalo, N.Y. Officials said the gunman entered the supermarket with a rifle and opened fire. Investigators believe the man may have been livestreaming the shooting and were looking into whether he had posted a manifesto online (Derek Gee/The Buffalo News via AP)
• Payton Gendron talks with his attorney during his arraignment in Buffalo City Court, Saturday, May 14, 2022, in Buffalo, N.Y. Gendron was arraigned on first-degree murder charges and ordered detained without bail. Police officials said the 18-year-old was wearing body armor and military-style clothing when he pulled up and opened fire at people at a Tops Friendly Market. (Mark Mulville/The Buffalo News via AP)
• (WIVB Photo/Hope Winter)
• Police walk along the perimeter of the scene after a shooting at a supermarket on Saturday, May 14, 2022, in Buffalo, N.Y. Officials said the gunman entered the supermarket with a rifle and opened fire. Investigators believe the man may have been livestreaming the shooting and were looking into whether he had posted a manifesto online. (AP Photo/Joshua Bessex)
• Flowers and candles lay outside the scene of a shooting at a supermarket, in Buffalo, N.Y., Sunday, May 15, 2022. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Federal agents interviewed Gendron’s parents and served multiple search warrants, the law enforcement official told the AP. Gendron’s parents were cooperating with investigators, the official said.

It wasn’t immediately clear why Gendron had traveled about 200 miles from his Conklin, New York, home to Buffalo and that particular grocery store, but investigators believe Gendron had specifically researched the demographics of the population around the Tops Friendly Market, the official said. The alleged manifesto claims to have targeted the zip code with the highest percentage of Black people nearby.

In a Sunday press conference, Gramaglia said that Gendron had been in town “at least the day before.”

“It seems that he had come here to scope out the area, to do a little reconnaissance work on the area before he carried out his just evil, sickening act,” Gramaglia said.

Latest on the Buffalo Supermarket Mass Shooting

Among the dead was security guard Aaron Salter — a retired Buffalo police officer — who fired multiple shots at Gendron, Gramaglia said Saturday. A bullet hit the gunman’s armor, but had no effect. Gendron then killed Salter, before hunting more victims.

“He cared about the community. He looked after the store,” Yvette Mack, who had shopped at Tops earlier Saturday, said of Salter. “He did a good job you know. He was very nice and respectable.”

Also killed was Ruth Whitfield, 86, the mother of retired Buffalo Fire Commissioner Garnell Whitfield.

Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown told churchgoers that he saw the former fire official at the shooting scene Saturday, looking for his mother.

“My mother had just gone to see my father, as she does every day, in the nursing home and stopped at the Tops to buy just a few groceries. And nobody has heard from her,” Whitfield told the mayor then. She was confirmed as a victim later in the day, Brown said.

Police surround home of Buffalo mass shooter

Katherine Massey, who had gone to the store to pick up some groceries, also was killed, according to the Buffalo News. The names of the rest of the victims hadn’t been released.

“We pray for their families. But after we pray — after we get up off of our knees — we’ve got to demand change. We’ve got to demand justice,” state Attorney General Letitia James said an emotional church service in Buffalo on Sunday morning. “This was domestic terrorism, plain and simple.”

The Buffalo attack came just a month after a shooting on a Brooklyn subway wounded 10 and just over a year after 10 were killed in a shooting at a Colorado supermarket.

Associated Press reporter Robert Bumsted contributed reporting from Buffalo, New York. Balsamo reported from Washington.

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David Rosner continually talks to colleagues who are distraught about the American response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

“When you are in a school of public health and a public health environment, people really feel when they are failing,” said Rosner, who studies public health and social history at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

That defeated feeling is compounded by the fact that 1 million people in the US have died from Covid-19 – the highest Covid death rate among large wealthy countries.

According to public health experts, the virus’s outsized impact on the US can be attributed in part to underinvestment in long-term care, in primary care and in public health departments. As a result, some people were more vulnerable to Covid and had little connection to – or trust in – the healthcare providers who urged them to socially distance, to wear masks and to get vaccinated.

It was a disconnect, they say, that was only exacerbated by misinformation – particularly by Republican leaders’ undermining of scientists’ recommendations.

“This is more than just a failure of a health system,” said Rosner. “It’s a failure of an American ideology.”

A history of poor healthcare quality and access

The problems in US society and healthcare that lead to the high death toll predate the pandemic.

In 2018, the country spent an average of $10,637 on healthcare per person, almost twice as much as other large and wealthy countries, according to data from the Kaiser Family Foundation. And yet, compared with those countries, the US had a significantly lower life expectancy and the worst healthcare quality and access.

Almost $4,000 of that additional spending comes from higher payments to hospitals for inpatient and outpatient hospital care. Meanwhile, over the last decade, US spending for state public and local health departments decreased by 16% and 18% respectively.

“We have really valued the hospital care to the exclusion of public health and community healthcare in this country,” said Sheila Davis, CEO of the non-profit Partners in Health, which tries to bring healthcare to the world’s poorest places.

She argues that reimbursement patterns in the US focus on care delivered at hospitals, “which is the most expensive place to deliver care, with the most expensive providers”, she said.

As an alternative, she points to a comprehensive model, “which has excellent hospital care but also has a strong public health department, as well as community care”, such as federally qualified health centers in underserved communities.

The one health area where the US spends significantly less than other countries is on long-term care, including nursing homes. In 2018, the country spent $516 a person on long-term care, less than half of what comparable countries spent, according to KFF data.

The pandemic exposed these disparities. About three-quarters of Americans who died from Covid were 65 or older – including more than 150,000 nursing home residents, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.

A majority – more than two-thirds – of nursing homes in the US are for-profit institutions. They often don’t pay their workers much, are understaffed and have high turnover rates: the mean US wage for nursing assistants and orderlies in 2020 was $14.82 an hour, and the mean turnover rate for nurse staff in 2017 and 2018 was 128%, according to a study.

A man talks with his mother through a window at a nursing home in Windsor, Connecticut, in May 2020. Photograph: Chris Ehrmann/AP

That understaffing saw some nursing homes fail to follow best practice for infection control, said Dr Celine Gounder, an epidemiologist at New York University and editor-at-large for Kaiser Health News.

“If you have workers who are paid poorly and have very difficult working conditions, they are not going to trust the employer as much,” Gounder said. “So in a crisis when you have lack of trust, that’s going to create barriers to everyone working in synchronicity to address problems.”

Almost half of the aides and personal care workers, who often make little money, are Black or Hispanic. Nursing homes whose staff come from “less white” neighborhoods saw larger Covid-19 outbreaks, probably because those neighborhoods are also generally denser and have residents who rely more on public transportation, according to a report from a Harvard University economist.

Nursing home residents “were the most vulnerable population – so if Covid made it into the building, bad outcomes were likely to follow shortly thereafter”, said Brian McGarry, a University of Rochester professor who studies long-term care.

In general, life just appeared to be more difficult for seniors in the US than those in similar countries – even before the pandemic. For example, US seniors tend to be more likely to worry about having enough money for meals or medical needs, and to not fill a prescription or skip doses because of the cost, according to a 2017 Health Affairs study.

In the US, 36% of older adults reported having three or more chronic conditions, such as chronic lung diseases and heart conditions, which placed people at greater risk of becoming severely ill from Covid. In New Zealand, Australia, the Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland, the figures were 17% or under. The US also had the highest rate – 55% – of people taking four or more prescriptions regularly.

Gounder’s grandparents lived in Normandy, France, and never had to worry about medical bills or whether they could see a doctor, she said. “There might be a wait to get an appointment, but they could always get the medical care they needed,” she said.

Americans are also less likely to have a primary care provider, which contributed to the high death toll here. In the Netherlands, 71% of adults have had a regular doctor or place of care for five years or more; in the US, the number is 43%, according to a study from the Commonwealth Fund, a non-profit focused on improving the health system.

“It’s especially a factor when it comes to the vaccination campaign,” said Dr David Blumenthal, president of the Commonwealth Fund. “We know from survey data that people like to get vaccinated in their primary care physician’s office, but too few Americans have primary care physicians.”

That shortage is due in part, Blumenthal said, to tuition fees and to the wage gap between primary care doctor and specialists – again, both figures where the US tops the charts.

“Compensation is an important factor: it’s not just how much people are paid but how hard they have to work to get that level of income,” said Blumenthal, who was a primary care physician himself. Without a primary care provider, he said, many sick people end up visiting emergency rooms – or not seeking care at all.

“In the pandemic, when you are going to an emergency room, you are surrounding yourself with tens or hundreds of other people, many of whom will not have been infected until you show up, so it’s not an epidemiologically helpful way to manage sick people,” Blumenthal said.

The approach to the pandemic became enmeshed in people’s party affiliation and in their views towards governmentDr David Blumenthal

Meanwhile, the US counties that were hit hardest after vaccines became available were those in which a majority voted for Donald Trump in 2020, according to a National Public Radio study.

Since vaccines became widely available in May 2021, people in counties where more than 60% of voters supported Trump were 2.73 times as likely to die from Covid than those in counties where that same percentage supported Joe Biden.

The US also trailed other large wealthy countries in its vaccination rate – and a contributor to that was the low vaccination rates among Republicans. As of November 2021, 91% of Democrats had received at least one dose of the vaccine, while only 53% of Republicans had, according to a Kaiser Family Foundation survey.

“You can’t separate our failure in the pandemic from conflicts over ideology and politics,” said Blumenthal. “The approach to the pandemic became enmeshed in people’s party affiliation and in their views towards government.”

People protest against the Covid vaccine in Tallahassee, Florida, in November 2021. Photograph: Rebecca Blackwell/AP

That’s in large part due to Republicans such as Trump, said Rosner. After the then-president contracted Covid in October 2020 and became much sicker than he publicly acknowledged, Trump wrote on Twitter: “Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life.” During a presidential debate, Trump also said of Biden: “I don’t wear masks like him. Every time you see him, he’s got a mask.”

Contrast that with another conservative politician, Boris Johnson, the UK prime minister, Rosner said. After also being hospitalized with Covid, Johnson thanked his nurses and said the National Health Service had saved his life “no question” and that “things could have gone either way”.

“It’s not like [Johnson] is some angel, but he acknowledged something deeper in British culture that in some sense trusted medicine, trusted public health, trusted the health system, in a way that Trump didn’t even feel was necessary,” said Rosner.

Preparing for the next emergency

Despite their dismay over the number of preventable Covid deaths, public health experts say they are encouraged by federal government efforts to make sure the US is better prepared for the next emergency, which they say is inevitable.

For example, the federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (Cares) Act included $300m for community health worker services to try to improve, among other things, health and mental health care access.

“We were very pleased with the inclusion of community health workers in a lot of the Biden administration funding during the emergency,” said Davis. “Now the goal – and the hope – is that that will [become] a permanent part of our health structure.”

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Tamara Smith is working to make sure that residents of Aiken and Barnwell counties take care of their mental health. 

Smith, the executive director of the Aiken-Barnwell Mental Health Center, helped to organize a community mental health fair that was held Friday afternoon at the center on Gregg Highway. 

“What we know is that one in five individuals will experience a mental health diagnosis in any given year,” Smith said. “We have also seen the rates for anxiety and depression increase. Aiken County has a high rate of suicide… It is important for us to share information with our community and make sure people know that mental health help is available.” 

She added May is Mental Health Month, the perfect opportunity to help Aiken County address its mental health needs. 

Smith said people who feel like they need mental health help can call the center at 803-641-7700 during business hours or the after hours crisis line at 833-364-2274. She added that people should take time to do something they enjoy everyday. 

She said people who have a loved one or friend who needs mental health help should check on that person and show they care. She added the center also has resources available and can send a crisis team if necessary. 

She added the South Carolina Department of Mental Health has an online screener, hope.connectsyou.org, for people to go and seek help. 

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Inventprise CEO Yves Leurquin inside the company’s new vaccine manufacturing facility. (GeekWire Photo / Charlotte Schubert)

Here’s a rundown of the top life sciences and health news across the Pacific Northwest this week.

Bill Gates helps open new vaccine manufacturing facility: Seattle-area biotech company Inventprise built the facility with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “For the Gates Foundation, Inventprise is a super important partner,” said Gates, who attended a ribbon-cutting event and tested positive for COVID-19 the next day.

Former Athira Pharma exec weighs in: Xue Hua, the company’s former head of clinical development and research, published a blog post criticizing the company’s handling of an investigation that led to the resignation of longtime CEO Leen Kawas in October.

Seagen CEO on leave amid domestic violence allegations: Police records detail the night that Seagen CEO Clay Siegall was arrested at his home last month and charged with a fourth degree domestic violence gross misdemeanor. Seagen announced Monday that Siegall is on a leave of absence and the company has initiated its own investigation.

GeekWire Awards winners: The GeekWire Awards were held live and in person for the first time in three years on Thursday. Read more about the winners here, including health data company Truveta, which took home the Health Innovation of the Year award. Other finalists in the category were: A-Alpha Bio, Parse Biosciences, Tasso, and the University of Washington’s Institute for Protein Design.

The California two-spot octopus (Octopus bimaculoides). (Z. Yan Wang Photo)

More life sciences news:

Recognition: Four University of Washington faculty members have been elected to the National Academy of Sciences: Elizabeth Buffalo, Joseph Mougous, Jay Shendure and emeritus professor Jim Truman.

Ambassador: Sister Dr. Jenna, a self-described “spiritual mentor,” joined Paris Hilton as an ambassador for Seattl-area microbiome company Viome. After using the company’s “precision supplements,” the host of the America Meditating radio show “began feeling such a change in my energy and feelings,” she said in a press release.

Studies:

• After she lays her eggs and tends to them, the female octopus dies in a process known to be mediated by glands between her eyes. The animals sometimes even harm themselves or eat their own limbs in the process. A new study led by University of Washington assistant professor of psychology and biology Z. Yan Wang outlines the chemical pathways that control the event.
• The composition of gut microbes may influence the body’s response to statins, drugs commonly prescribed for cardiovascular disease, according to research led by the Institute for Systems Biology. The group found that certain classes of bacteria were associated with stronger response to the drugs. The findings could lead to new ways to predict who is likely to respond and more precise calibration of drug dosing.
• Scientists have long speculated that individuals might have different susceptibility to accumulating mutations in their DNA. University of Washington assistant professor Kelley Harris and her colleagues have now found a gene in mice that affects the rate at which mutations accumulate in the rest of the genome. The findings have implications for understanding heredity and susceptibility to cancer.
• Fred Hutch and University of Washington researchers have identified some of the unique immune cells that are found in the vicinity of human solid tumors, providing potential targets for new therapies.

Event: The UW’s Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine is hosting five speakers at its Stem Cell Symposium on Thursday, May 19. The event is in person and virtual.

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New Delhi, The National Health Authority (NHA) on Friday conducted an exclusive convention for technology partners of Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (ABDM) to discuss different ways in which the digital health ecosystem of India can be strengthened further here.

Addressing the participants, R.S. Sharma, CEO, NHA said: “The core objective of ABDM is to leverage technology to deliver health services to remotest areas of the country. To address the lack of infrastructure and access to doctors, ABDM envisages all healthcare related activities to move online. For this, it is imperative that we take up the onboarding of healthcare professionals and health facilities in the national registries of Healthcare Professionals Registry (HPR) and Health Facilities Registry (HFR) being built by ABDM.

Dr Sharma said further that the health tech players can bring in innovative solutions with lesser steps to onboard professionals & facilities using the open APIs published. They can further train other small players on ABDM onboard process and spread awareness about benefits of registering in HFR and HPR.

“We also seek inputs from the health tech partners as to how we can activate the ecosystem for building digital public goods (DPGs), expanding the scope of DPGs like online reservation system (ORS) created by NIC, blood bank by NIC/CDAC, universal immunisation, NOTTO, and also taking them to the end-users in a more structured and easily adaptable manner,” Sharma added further.

The event brought together representatives from over 40 health tech organisations from the government and private sector to discuss the ways ahead for digital health ecosystem of India and the scheme updates, upcoming features under ABDM and the challenges faced on the way.

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FRIDAY, May 13, 2022 (HealthDay News) — School children aged 6 to 8 years with overweight have cardiometabolic derangements, according to a study published online May 3 in Obesity Research & Clinical Practice to coincide with the Congress on Obesity, held from May 4 to 7 in Maastricht.

Christine Frithioff-Bøjsøe, M.D., Ph.D., from Copenhagen University Hospital Holbæk in Denmark, and colleagues conducted a prospective population-based cohort involving 335 preschool children (age 2.5 and 5 years) and 657 school children (aged 6 to 8 years) to examine the early detection of childhood overweight (including obesity) and related cardiometabolic complications. A subset of 392 children participated in hospital-based examinations, and were re-examined about one year later.

The researchers found that the prevalence of overweight was 13.73 and 13.69 percent in preschool and school children, respectively, at baseline. Minor differences were seen in cardiometabolic risk factors in preschool children with and without overweight, while school children with overweight had manifest cardiometabolic derangements, including significantly higher levels of fasting glucose, insulin, homoeostasis model of assessment for insulin resistance, triglycerides, and alanine aminotransferase and lower levels of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol. The prevalence of overweight did not change in preschool children during follow-up, but increased to 17.0 percent in school children.

“The present study suggests that early childhood — as early as age 2 to 5 years — is the time to detect these conditions, as complications from overweight, including derangements in glucose metabolism, may become evident when the children are just a few years older,” the authors write.

The study was partially funded by the Novo Nordisk Foundation.

Abstract/Full Text

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RaDonda Vaught listens to victim impact statements during her sentencing in Nashville. She was found guilty in March of criminally negligent homicide and gross neglect of an impaired adult after she accidentally administered the wrong medication.

Nicole Hester/AP

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RaDonda Vaught listens to victim impact statements during her sentencing in Nashville. She was found guilty in March of criminally negligent homicide and gross neglect of an impaired adult after she accidentally administered the wrong medication.

Nicole Hester/AP

RaDonda Vaught, a former Tennessee nurse convicted of two felonies for a fatal drug error, whose trial became a rallying cry for nurses fearful of the criminalization of medical mistakes, will not be required to spend any time in prison.

Davidson County criminal court Judge Jennifer Smith on Friday granted Vaught a judicial diversion, which means her conviction will be expunged if she completes a three-year probation.

Smith said the Murphey family suffered a “terrible loss” and “nothing that happens here today can ease that loss.”

“Miss Vaught is well aware of the seriousness of the offense,” Smith said. “She credibly expressed remorse in this courtroom.”

The judge noted that Vaught had no criminal record, has been removed from the health care setting, and will never practice nursing again. The judge also said, “This was a terrible, terrible mistake and there have been consequences to the defendant.”

As the sentence was read, cheers erupted from a crowd of hundreds of purple-clad protesters who gathered outside the courthouse in opposition to Vaught’s prosecution.

Vaught, 38, a former nurse at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, faced up to eight years in prison. In March she was convicted of criminally negligent homicide and gross neglect of an impaired adult for the 2017 death of 75-year-old patient Charlene Murphey. Murphey was prescribed Versed, a sedative, but Vaught inadvertently gave her a fatal dose of vecuronium, a powerful paralyzer.

Charlene Murphey’s son, Michael Murphey, testified at Friday’s sentencing hearing that his family remains devastated by the sudden death of their matriarch. She was “a very forgiving person” who would not want Vaught to serve any prison time, he said, but his widower father wanted Murphey to receive “the maximum sentence.”

“My dad suffers every day from this,” Michael Murphey said. “He goes out to the graveyard three to four times a week and just sits out there and cries.”

Vaught’s case stands out because medical errors ― even deadly ones ― are generally within the purview of state medical boards and lawsuits are almost never prosecuted in criminal court.

The Davidson County district attorney’s office, which did not advocate for any particular sentence or oppose probation, has described Vaught’s case as an indictment of one careless nurse, not the entire nursing profession. Prosecutors argued in trial that Vaught overlooked multiple warning signs when she grabbed the wrong drug, including failing to notice Versed is a liquid and vecuronium is a powder.

Vaught admitted her error after the mix-up was discovered, and her defense largely focused on arguments that an honest mistake should not constitute a crime.

During the hearing on Friday, Vaught said she was forever changed by Murphey’s death and was “open and honest” about her error in an effort to prevent future mistakes by other nurses. Vaught also said there was no public interest in sentencing her to prison because she could not possibly re-offend after her nursing license was revoked.

“I have lost far more than just my nursing license and my career. I will never be the same person,” Vaught said, her voice quivering as she began to cry. “When Ms. Murphey died, a part of me died with her.”

At one point during her statement, Vaught turned to face Murphey’s family, apologizing for both the fatal error and how the public campaign against her prosecution may have forced the family to relive their loss.

“You don’t deserve this,” Vaught said. “I hope it does not come across as people forgetting your loved one. … I think we are just in the middle of systems that don’t understand one another.”

Prosecutors also argued at trial that Vaught circumvented safeguards by switching the hospital’s computerized medication cabinet into “override” mode, which made it possible to withdraw medications not prescribed to Murphey, including vecuronium. Other nurses and nursing experts have told KHN that overrides are routinely used in many hospitals to access medication quickly.

Theresa Collins, a travel nurse from Georgia who closely followed the trial, said she will no longer use the feature, even if it delays patients’ care, after prosecutors argued it proved Vaught’s recklessness.

“I’m not going to override anything beyond basic saline. I just don’t feel comfortable doing it anymore,” Collins said. “When you criminalize what health care workers do, it changes the whole ballgame.”

Danielle Threet, left, a nurse and friend of RaDonda Vaught, stands next to her mother, Alex Threet, at a rally in support of Vaught outside the Davidson County Courthouse in Nashville ahead of sentencing.

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Danielle Threet, left, a nurse and friend of RaDonda Vaught, stands next to her mother, Alex Threet, at a rally in support of Vaught outside the Davidson County Courthouse in Nashville ahead of sentencing.

Brett Kelman/Kaiser Health News

Vaught’s prosecution drew condemnation from nursing and medical organizations that said the case’s dangerous precedent would worsen the nursing shortage and make nurses less forthcoming about mistakes.

The case also spurred considerable backlash on social media as nurses streamed the trial through Facebook and rallied behind Vaught on TikTok. That outrage inspired Friday’s protest in Nashville, which drew supporters from as far as Massachusetts, Wisconsin and Nevada.

Among those protesters was David Peterson, a nurse who marched Thursday in Washington, D.C., to demand health care reforms and safer nurse-patient staffing ratios, then drove through the night to Nashville and slept in his car so he could protest Vaught’s sentencing. The events were inherently intertwined, he said.

“The things being protested in Washington, practices in place because of poor staffing in hospitals, that’s exactly what happened to RaDonda. And it puts every nurse at risk every day,” Peterson said. “It’s cause and effect.”

Tina Vinsant, a Knoxville nurse and podcaster who organized the Nashville protest, said the group had spoken with Tennessee lawmakers about legislation to protect nurses from criminal prosecution for medical errors and would pursue similar bills “in every state.”

Vinsant said they would pursue this campaign even though Vaught was not sent to prison.

“She shouldn’t have been charged in the first place,” Vinsant said. “I want her not to serve jail time, of course, but the sentence doesn’t really affect where we go from here.”

Janis Peterson, a recently retired ICU nurse from Massachusetts, said she attended the protest after recognizing in Vaught’s case the all-too-familiar challenges from her own nursing career. Peterson’s fear was a common refrain among nurses: “It could have been me.”

“And if it was me, and I looked out that window and saw 1,000 people who supported me, I’d feel better,” she said. “Because for every one of those 1,000, there are probably 10 more who support her but couldn’t come.”

Nashville Public Radio’s Blake Farmer contributed to this report.

KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. It is an editorially independent operating program of KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation).

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The Hartford HealthCare LGBTQ+ Colleague Resource Group joined fans at Dunkin’ Donuts Park in Hartford this Week as the Hartford Yard Goats celebrated Pride Night.

“The evening was an opportunity to highlight some of the advances that Hartford HealthCare is making in working with LGBTQ+ patients as well as supporting their LGBTQ+ colleagues,” said Laura Saunders, PsyD, ABPP.

Dr. Saunders gave an on-field presentation before the game and also threw out the first pitch. Being a softball player in high school paid off – the ball landed right over the plate.

The LGBTQ+ Colleague Resource Group consists of over 40 Hartford HealthCare allies and LGBTQ+ community members, who volunteer because they feel passionate about ensuring high-quality care is available to all. Their goal is to provide an equitable, affirming and supportive environment for LGBTQ+ patients, families and staff by creating a culture in which healthcare is delivered to all with sensitivity, kindness and respect.

“I am thankful to be involved in the process of ensuring HHC is visibly inclusive to the LGBTQ+ community through our actions, processes and environments. Every person deserves to feel safe, respected and supported in being their authentic selves,” said colleague resource group co-chair Valerie Martin.

The game was sponsored by Connecticut VOICE magazine, a multi-platform offering readers and viewers the ability to experience VOICE an award-winning quarterly publication VOICE, a television show CT VOICE Out Loud on WTNH and a podcast Out Loud.

The next Pride Night with the Yard Goats is scheduled for July 14.

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Contact:
Erin Horn
Sanford Health Media Relations, Bismarck Region
701-516-4903 / erin.horn@sanfordhealth.org

WILLISTON, N.D. — Sanford Health is breaking ground on a new multispecialty clinic on the site of Williston Square. This clinic is the next step in Sanford’s 100-year plan to serve Williston and its surrounding communities as a leader in rural health care.

Located on the corner of 33rd Street and Second Avenue west, the clinic will include primary and specialty services, an infusion center, imaging equipment and lab.

“We are excited to move forward with our vision of bringing enhanced health care to Williston and its surrounding communities,” said Todd Schaffer, MD, president/CEO of the Bismarck region of Sanford Health. “Last year we purchased 25 acres of land in Williston Square with the vision of creating a regional center for health care in Williston. We remain committed to working closely with the City of Williston and the community board to plan future services that will better serve the needs of patients closer to home.”

“Today’s groundbreaking cements Williston’s commitment to bringing the best health care possible to the citizens of our region,” said Williston Mayor Howard Klug. “Not only will there be a state-of-the-art clinic, but this project will support partnerships with Williston State College and other universities to provide educational opportunities for future health care workers. Our region continues to see exciting growth and opportunities, and Sanford Health and Williston Square will be ready to serve the development of northwest North Dakota and eastern Montana.”

In addition to health care, Williston Square, an 800-acre development on the former site of Sloulin Field International Airport, includes plans for a Civic Center, shopping, restaurants and new residential homes and apartment buildings.

About the City of Williston

Founded in 1887, the City of Williston is the county seat of Williams County and is situated at the confluence of the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers. The City is a regional hub for business, leisure, and economic development in northwest North Dakota. The City operates under the governance of a five-member Commission which includes the Mayor. The City is made up of 12 major departments and almost 400 employees. Learn more about the City of Williston at www.cityofwilliston.com.

About Sanford Health

The Sanford Bismarck region provides health care to central and western North Dakota, eastern Montana and northern South Dakota. It includes 21 clinics in Bismarck, Mandan, Minot, Dickinson and Watford City, as well as a Level II trauma center located in Bismarck. Sanford Health, the largest rural health system in the United States, is dedicated to transforming the health care experience and providing access to world-class health care in America’s heartland. Headquartered in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, the organization serves more than one million patients and 220,000 health plan members across 250,000 square miles. The integrated health system has 47 medical centers, 2,800 Sanford physicians and advanced practice providers, 170 clinical investigators and research scientists, more than 200 Good Samaritan Society senior care locations and world clinics in 8 countries around the globe. Learn more about Sanford Health’s commitment to shaping the future of rural health care across the lifespan at sanfordhealth.org or Sanford Health News.

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