In the News

Community health centers in Massachusetts will receive more than $36.5 million to assist in combating the COVID-19 outbreak. The funding was awarded under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, the state’s congressional delegation and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced Wednesday. Local recipients include the Caring Health Center in… Read more »

Warning that Massachusetts hospitals could run out of ventilators in a matter of days, members of the state’s federal delegation are pressing officials to fill the state’s request for the highly sought-after medical devices to steel itself against an expected surge of COVID-19 patients. Governor Charlie Baker said Sunday the state had received a shipment of 100 ventilators… Read more »

With nearly 10 million Americans — 330,000 Massachusetts residents among them — filing for unemployment in the last two weeks, U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal is asking why the U.S. Department of Labor has yet to distribute emergency administrative funding so states can process the claims. The Labor Department released new data on first-time unemployment claims Thursday. The $2.2… Read more »

Five cities in the 1st Congressional District represented by U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal are getting $4.8 million under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act passed last week in Washington. Neal, D-Springfield, announced the local grants and recipients. The program is rolling out nationwide under the $2.2 trillion federal economic stimulus plan. The money comes… Read more »

Massachusetts Congressman Richard Neal held a telephone town hall Tuesday to answer constituents’ questions about COVID-19. The Democrat from the 1st District hosted the call with Dr. James Lederer, the chief medical officer and chief quality officer at Berkshire Medical Center – the county’s largest hospital in Pittsfield. Lederer addressed a question about what… Read more »

HOLYOKE, Mass. (WWLP) – The Holyoke community is mourning after 13 deaths were reported at the Soldiers’ Home Tuesday. Local veterans are also mourning the loss of these vets. “It’s a terrible thing, I mean I talked to veterans this morning and they are depressed. It’s like how can you let that happen?” asked Paul Mina of Springfield, son of a WWII… Read more »

HOLYOKE, MA (WGGB/WHSM) -- Government officials want answers and an investigation into what happened to veterans at the Soldiers’ Home who tested positive for COVID-19. Some even died from it. As of Tuesday, 13 residents in the soldiers home have died, according to the Massachusetts Health and Human Services. Six of them tested positive for the coronavirus. Five results are… Read more »

Pittsfield — Berkshire Health Systems does not have enough testing kits for COVID-19 and has been limiting tests only to exposed staff and those in the community who exhibit specific symptoms for the virus. In addition, BHS hospitals need more ventilators, a BHS doctor said Tuesday. “We don’t have as many test kits that we’d like to have,” Dr. James Lederer,… Read more »

HOLYOKE — U.S. Rep. Richard Neal on Tuesday called for accountability after revelations about a dozen deaths at the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke, with several linked to the coronavirus pandemic. During a telephone town hall, meanwhile, Neal reassured a woman whose husband lives in the state-run facility that public officials are working to understand what happened there and what… Read more »

U.S. Rep. Richard Neal is pushing for COVID-19 relief package checks to be issued to seniors and vulnerable groups automatically without needing to file any additional information with the federal government. In a statement Tuesday, Neal said he and other lawmakers had “been inundated with calls from concerned senior citizens regarding their ability to receive” checks… Read more »