Vaccines Bring Hope

Volunteers Give Vaccinations at Denver Church

(April 2021) In early February, volunteers from the University of Colorado School of Medicine and UCHealth gave COVID-19 vaccinations at Shorter Community AME Church in Denver. More than 500 people came to the church to get their vaccines.

The Rev. Dr. Timothy E. Tyler, pastor of the church said that AME churches have long provided comfort for the sick.

“During the yellow fever epidemic of 1793, Bishop Richard Allen, the founder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church and member of Mother Bethel AME Church, risked their own health and lives to care for dying citizens in Philadelphia,” Tyler told UCHealth Today. “It’s been in our DNA to get out in the community and be a part of solutions to pandemics.”

Congregants and neighbors – some dressed in their Sunday finest – came to the church that day.  

School of Medicine Dean John J. Reilly, Jr., MD, and Shanta Zimmer, MD, senior associate dean for education and associate dean for diversity and inclusion, were among the volunteers administering the shots.