The mayor of Belle Glade, Florida, has suffered repeat losses within his family due to COVID-19 and people being unvaccinated.
Lisa Wilson, an aide to Palm Beach County Commissioner Melissa McKinlay and the wife of Bell Glade Mayor Steve Wilson, has spent the last few weeks in and out of their local chapel to bury her unvaccinated family members who passed away from COVID, WPTV reports.
“It’s just been really bad for my family. We’re really, really struggling,” Wilson said. “I’m still trying to wrap my brain around it. I don’t have (any) words for it. I don’t know.”
It all started three weeks ago when Lisa’s 48-year-old uncle, Tyrone Moreland
, fell sick to COVID and was hospitalized. Moreland died from the virus shortly after.“Maybe a week after he was hospitalized, then my grandmother was hospitalized, also,” Lisa Wilson said.
But unfortunately, 89-year-old Lillie Mae Dukes Moreland died two days after her son was buried. She then lost three cousins who were all unvaccinated to COVID. The government aide works daily to educate the public about getting the vaccine. However, she was unable to motivate her own family to take action.
“I work side by side with the communities and constantly push the message to get people vaccinated,” Wilson told CNN, “but I couldn’t convince my family members to get vaccinated.”
Despite all the heartbreaking loss, she’s endured the last three weeks, Lisa Wilson is still
advocating for the vaccine and urges Belle Glade residents to protect themselves.“My family is going through a hard time, and I wouldn’t wish that on any family member anywhere,” she said. “If my family was vaccinated, they would be here today.”
“They were just scared,” she said of why her family wasn’t vaccinated. “Everything was new, and they were just scared.”