In late April, a coronavirus research team from the CDC fanned out across two predominantly Black counties in Georgia, going door to door in face shields asking for samples of blood with little prior warning. The plan backfired.
As the virus disproportionately sickens and kills people of color, the CDC has sent several hundred staffers on missions to states including Georgia, North Carolina, California and Arkansas. They’ve embedded in overburdened local health departments, held focus groups with workers of color and made recommendations to states on targeted testing, bilingual contract tracing and culturally sensitive outreach.
The CDC’s report, obtained by POLITICO, made sweeping recommendations for government action: Test high-risk populations every week; notify people of positive tests within 24 hours; pay people who need to stay home and quarantine; hire bilingual contact tracers and create culturally-appropriate PSAs in Spanish and Marshallese.
That gap was an issue when CDC Director Robert Redfield joined a delegation this month to Mecklenburg County in North Carolina, where Latinos are 14 percent of the population but one in three of the diagnosed cases. Harris said Redfield understood her concerns and she’s aware of the constraints on the CDC, which has been largely sidelined by the Trump administration throughout the pandemic.
North Carolina hit at least 2,000 new cases Friday and hospitalizations have remained above 1,000 since July 9. Latinos make upIn the worst cases, the CDC's tendency to parachute into communities has left residents confused and terrified. The CDC experts arrived for their weeklong mission in DeKalb and Fulton counties on April 28, only one day after receiving final approval for their antibody project, which would help track how the virus was spreading disproportionately among Black residents. Sandra Elizabeth Ford, director of the DeKalb County Board of Health, said her office barely got a heads up and had to scramble to do the community outreach the federal team failed to do.
The CDC’s website says it has deployed staff to support Navajo Nation, the White Mountain Apache Tribe, the Hopi Tribe, and two other tribes. It held one of its first listening sessions with the National Indian Health Board this month.
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