Dr. Jerry Abraham is committed to ensuring that the most vulnerable communities in California have access to the Covid-19 vaccine.
Abraham has spent the past few months calling on state officials to demand vaccine doses for black and brown people in southern Los Angeles, developing vaccination sites that accommodate ambulatory patients, organizing mass vaccination events with entertainers, and deploying mobile vaccination fleets. in neighborhoods where residents have no transportation.
Abraham, director of vaccines at Kedren Community Health Center, said he now vaccinates 5,000 people a day and fills a gap in a community that might otherwise be neglected.
“We broke all the barriers that were between people and their vaccines,” Abraham told CNN. “No appointment, okay. No internet or email, phone or transportation, I can’t walk, talk or see, I can’t speak English, no papers, no home, none of that was a barrier.”
California remains one of the states with the worst disparities in vaccinating its Latino population despite efforts like Abraham’s and a state mandate that allocates 40% of vaccine doses to underserved communities.
According to state data, 20% of vaccine doses have been administered to Latinos, who represent 39% of the population and 56% of cases.
And 3% of vaccines have been given to black people in California, who account for 6% of the population and 4% of cases. Meanwhile, whites have received 29% of vaccines and account for 20% of cases and 37% of the population.
Health advocates say vaccine misinformation and lack of access have been key reasons for racial inequalities in California.
They are now urging the state and its partners to boost vaccination efforts in communities of color to prevent the disparity from growing when all California adults become eligible for prey on April 15th. Some fear that residents with internet, transportation, and work capacity will continue to outdo the poor Latino and black communities that have been hardest hit by Covid-19.
California officials were attacked earlier this year, when a vaccination program for seniors living in black and black Latino communities was misused by outsiders who obtained the special group codes needed to schedule appointments.
Governor Gavin Newsom responded by saying that group codes were being abused and that the program would move to individual codes. About a week later, the Newsom administration announced that it was reserving 40% of vaccine doses for the hardest-hit communities.
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