Community Corner
Worcester Quality Inn Will Serve As Coronavirus Shelter
Members of the homeless community and low-income residents will be able to live at the hotel to escape risk of contracting coronavirus.
WORCESTER, MA — A Worcester hotel will serve as a shelter for homeless and low-income people who need medical care and other services during the coronavirus crisis.
The Quality Inn along Oriole Drive will house about 100 people. The state of Massachusetts is paying for the facility, and it is the sixth one across the state. Apart from homeless people, the hotel will be open to people who need a place to stay if someone in their household has been diagnosed with coronavirus.
Residents of the Quality Inn shelter will get services like 24-7 nursing, in-room food service, behavioral health resources, and items for families like diapers and cribs. There are income limits on who can use the shelter. It will be open to MassHealth recipients and people who are uninsured and earn less than 133 percent of the federal poverty line.
Last week, Worcester closed a field hospital for the homeless at the DCU Center. The 10 people who were residing there were sent to a hotel in Northampton to continue getting care. That Northampton hotel is the same type of facility that was set up at the Quality Inn.
On Monday, Worcester's coronavirus cases rose by 47 from Sunday to 2,971. Overall coronavirus hospitalizations in the city dropped by eight people to 269, but intensive-care beds increased by one. Deaths at Worcester's hospitals rose by five to 175.
Worcester Medical Director Michael Hirsh said local coronavirus cases rose notably over the last week — a time when health officials thought the city had hit a plateau. But recent number are showing promise that Worcester could be coming out of the worst of the pandemic.
"Maybe this will be the inflection point, and we'll start seeing a decrease," Hirsh said.
