PHM-Exch> Coronavirus

[Todd Jailer]

Hi Claudio, Here's a note from Hesperian on the dealing with the social 
determinants of health and the coronavirus in the US. Perhaps you might 
post it on the PHM listserv.

You can use this on-line link as well: 
https://hesperian.org/2020/03/05/coronavirus/

And here's the link to our COVID-19 Fact Sheet: 
https://en.hesperian.org/hhg/Coronavirus in English. Spanish will be up 
shortly, and Kreyol and French next week.

Stay well, Todd Jailer, Hesperian

*************

Coronavirus

Coronavirus is all over the news and people are looking for how-to, 
actionable information on surviving the pandemic. But limiting advice 
and actions to improving individual or community hygiene is only washing 
our hands of the problem. To successfully defeat the looming epidemic, 
we have to change a health system that places profit over health. We 
have to recognize and address the political, social and economic factors 
–the social determinants of health -- that govern how health or illness 
moves through our communities.

Most of what to do immediately about coronavirus (or COVID-19) is 
already known: Wash your hands; don’t touch your face so often; stay 
home if you are sick. Clean surfaces often that are touched by multiple 
people. Since the virus is mostly transmitted by respiration, cough or 
sneeze into your elbow, wear a mask if you are sick or around sick 
people, or stay about 6 feet away from people you speak with if you 
think the virus is active in your area. (See our COVID-19 Fact Sheet for 
more details.)

While individual action is important, it will not stop an epidemic, only 
collective action will. We have to start acting like the connections 
among us are not routes to transmit disease, but the channels through 
which we can defeat it. There are many actions and policies we can 
demand to lower the possibility that COVID-19 becomes epidemic in the 
United States:

1) Guaranteed income for people affected by the virus.

Most of us live paycheck to paycheck and cannot afford to stay home from 
work without pay. Quarantines are difficult enough for people without 
making them worse by causing financial disaster.

The federal government has refused to require employers to pay sick 
leave, and even states that do -- California requires only 3 days a year 
– would not cover the time necessary for your quarantine, much less if 
your quarantine is because someone else in your household is sick. And 
how would people with the lowest wages survive, those in service or 
production jobs who cannot telecommute (as our health advisors so 
blithely suggest), if their employers shut down?If schools are closed to 
prevent disease from spreading, how will adults stay home with children 
and not lose their jobs or income?

In places like the Bay Area, where housing costs take the lion’s share 
of monthly expenses, it may also be necessary to declare mortgage 
holidays and a moratorium on evictions.

2) Free access to testing and treatment

The cost of health care already stops people from getting timely testing 
and treatment for health problems. With coronavirus, our health system 
is a prescription for an epidemic.

The CDC bungled producing testing kits for COVID-19, and hospitals still 
have a shortage. People who have been tested are being charged thousands 
of dollars. When asked about treatment costs, HHS Secretary Azar refused 
to say treatment would be affordable: “We can’t control that price 
because we need the private sector to invest."

If the US continues on the health-care-for-profit path, it insures the 
epidemic will be more widespread and more severe. Free access to testing 
and treatment for coronavirus is essential, as it is for other health 
conditions. Demand access to care now and in November don’t vote for 
anyone who doesn’t support Medicare for All – they’re basically telling 
you that saving your life is too expensive.

3) Prioritize reaching the most vulnerable communities

People of color and low-income communities have more exposure to disease 
and less access to health care facilities. We can’t perpetuate this 
injustice in our coronavirus response.

People already sick, especially those with breathing problems, have a 
higher chance of getting severely ill and dying from COVID-19. 
Environmental racism places factories and freeways disproportionately in 
poor communities of color, leading, for example, to 20% more asthma 
among African Americans. By prioritizing reaching communities 
marginalized by the medical system with necessary supplies, testing and 
treatment, we can slow the epidemic and begin to undo the deadly 
relationship of ill health, inequity and injustice.

These are all achievable demands. To win them, we have to organize 
pressure on our local, state and national governments from our 
neighborhood organizations, unions, churches, professional groups, and 
within the political parties that are contending for our votes this 
election year.

We can also organize locally to care for each other:

--Reorient your Neighborhood Watch or Earthquake Preparedness group to 
check up on your neighbors. Find out who is sick and who needs help.

--Expand the reach of Meals on Wheels and other such programs to feed 
those in quarantine.

--Volunteer and train others to be community health outreach workers to 
help answer questions and prepare your neighborhood for the coronavirus.

-- Support “gig workers,” the human backbone of food and supplies order 
and delivery apps, in their struggles to be paid for the time and 
disinfection suppliesthey need to safely support people stuck at home in 
quarantine.

What really stands out in the face of an epidemic like coronavirus is 
our leaders’ antagonism to the concept of “the public good” -- unless 
it’s profitable, it just shouldn’t exist. Our public health systems have 
been weakened by millions of dollars of budget cuts, an opposition to 
regulation of both pollution and greed, and the refusal to build or 
maintain common infrastructure. If we are going to survive coronavirus 
with a minimum of deaths, we need to replace our health-for-profit 
system with one that recognizes that health is a human right.

-- 
Todd Jailer, Managing Editor

Hesperian Health Guides
Knowledge for action.
Action for health.

todd at hesperian.org
www.hesperian.org

1919 Addison Street, Suite 304
Berkeley, California 94704
tel: (510) 845-1447 x 229
fax: (510) 845-0539

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