NEW YORK -- Yankee Stadium was opened as a COVID-19 mass vaccination site Friday by officials trying to boost inoculation rates in surrounding Bronx neighborhoods hard hit by the pandemic.
The home of the New York Yankees is being restricted to residents of the New York City borough with the highest percentage of positive coronavirus test results. Mayor Bill de Blasio called it "a different kind of opening day'' hours after a long line formed outside the stadium on a damp morning.
"This is about protecting people who need the most protection because the Bronx is one of the places that bore the brunt of this crisis of the coronavirus," he said at a stadium-side news conference.