Lehigh Valley Health Network plans to host another mass COVID-19 vaccination drive-through event at Dorney Park & Wildwater Kingdom. It's scheduled for Wednesday from 8am-to-4pm. If you fall within the Phase 1A category, you can schedule an appointment for the drive-through clinic at mylvhn.org or by calling the LVHN COVID-19 Vaccine Hotline at 833-LVHN-CVD. LVHN expects to vaccinate 4,000 people with first doses of the Moderna vaccine on Wednesday.
Researchers from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center are reporting promising results from their preliminary analysis on a COVID-19 treatment. UPMC officials say they gave about 1000 people monoclonal antibody treatments and their data shows that it cut the risk of hospitalization and death related to the virus by 70-ercent. This therapy, which was given to former President Trump last October, had the strongest effect on older patients and works best if given with ten says of testing positive for the virus. They urge people with COVID-19 symptoms to ask their doctors about this treatment.
New Jersey is once again expanding its coronavirus vaccination eligibility. Beginning today, essential workers like restaurant staff will be able to sign up for a dose. Grocery store and warehouse employees also join the growing list. The state plans to allow people ages 55 and older along with those 16 and up who have developmental disorders to roll up their sleeves next month.
New Jersey is making headway in the race to vaccinate. The state has already administered nearly four-million doses of the coronavirus vaccine. That includes more than 1.4-million who are fully vaccinated. The latest numbers come as the state reported another 3900 new infections and 16 new coronavirus-related deaths. New Jersey says its number of COVID-19 hospitalizations remained the same over the weekend.
Nearly 1000 employees of New Jersey transportation agencies received a coronavirus vaccine. New Jersey Transit and several other systems, like the New Jersey Department of Transportation, teamed up with Walgreens Saturday to vaccinate workers. Staffers received the first dose of the Pfizer vaccine and are set to return for their second dose in roughly three weeks.
The Monroe County District Attorney's office is set to release its findings on a deadly police-involved shooting from last December. 19-year-old Christian Hall was shot and killed by state police on December 30th on a bridge in Hamilton Township after reports of a distraught man with a gun. Police say Hall had a gun and was pointing it in their direction. However, civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump says videos online show Hall had his hands up before being shot. The DA's office will release its findings regarding use-of-force tomorrow.
A weekend Berks County crash killed an Allentown man. The crash happened around 6 o'clock Saturday night just outside Reading. 31-year-old Elvis Colon-Ramirez died at the scene. The crash remains under investigation.
Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey says there's some support in his own party for universal background checks. He tells NBC's Meet the Press the issue of violence isn't about too many guns, but rather who has access to them. "There are Republican senators who are interested, not because it's some bank shot to prevent the Democrats from abusing their power with respect to the filibuster, but because there's some substantive support," the Republican said. Toomey says there's at least one gun-related issue nearly everyone can agree on and that is the need to keep guns out of the hands of dangerously mentally ill people.
A Stroudsburg man will be spending a lot of time behind bars. Daniel Palmitessa has been sentenced to 20 years in prison after being found guilty of producing child pornography. Palmitessa was creating child porn from 2013 to 2016 and he also tried to persuade a minor into engaging in sexual activity with him online in 2018. Palmitessa will be also serving ten years of probation after his prison sentence ends.
A former Lackawanna County corrections officer is suing the state attorney general. In 2018, Paul Voglino was arrested along with six other county corrections officers on charges of a sexual abuse case at the county prison. However, the charges against Voglino were dropped by the attorney general's office and Voglino says he never should have been arrested. He is asking for $150,000 in damages from the state.