U.S. Rep. Raul Ruiz joined former second lady of the United States Jill Biden and others Saturday in a virtual summit to discuss coronavirus and its impacts on health care and Latino communities.
Ruiz, a Palm Desert Democrat, served as moderator for the League of United Latin American Citizens-hosted event along with Biden, wife of presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, U.S. Rep. Filemon Vela, a Democrat from Texas, and Dr. Robert Rodriguez, an emergency medicine professor at the University of California, San Francisco’s School of Medicine.
Amirah Sequeira, Senior Legislative Adviser at National Nurses United, also participated in the 75-minute discussion that addressed coronavirus disparities, hot spot reports and how to be a must-have worker.
“It is exactly now in this global pandemic, that Latin American communities are inflamed and dying disproportionately by COVID-19, that we will have to work to expand access to care and fitness tests, and to make sure it is available to all.communities across the United States,” Ruiz says.
During the discussion, Ruiz said the pandemic had disproportionately affected communities of color.
Blacks and Latinos are 4 times more likely than whites to be hospitalized for COVID-19, according to a report released Thursday through the National Urban League.
The report also noted, based on data from the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Equity, the racial makeup of staff across the country that would possibly paint from home: 19.7% for blacks, 16.2% for Latinos, and 29.9% for whites.
Latinos are most at risk of contracting the virus due to the large number of workers, Ruiz said, and are also more at risk of dying due to pre-existing conditions, such as diabetes and asthma.
In addition, Latinos are at increased risk of spreading the virus because many families in multigenerational families and are at higher risk of fewer resources, such as targeted evidence, Ruiz said.
“That’s what the public knows about fitness and what I’ve noticed on the ground,” he said.
At one point, Biden praised Ruiz, who is a physician, for his local efforts to provide evidence to agricultural staff in the Coachella Valley.
“She showed incredible leadership in this pandemic,” she told Ruiz, who before being elected to Congress, working as an emergency doctor at Eisenhower Health-Rancho Mirage.
Biden also spoke about how the pandemic “was devastating” in black and Latino communities.
“COVID has been kind to the injustices and inequalities that have plagued our country for too long,” he said. I said, “That’s true.”
Rodriguez, a professor of emergency medicine, spoke of the need for immediate reaction groups made up of doctors, nurses and respiratory therapists who are able to provide critical point assistance.
“You can’t wait for a crisis to hit a specific position and then, you know, check to send other people later,” he said. “It just doesn’t work. You’re going to lose a lot of lives this way.”
Sequeira also talked about the fact that nurses have good enough non-public protective equipment.
Throughout the discussion, Biden responded to the perspectives of the expert table and explained how a Joe Biden presidency would deal with the coronavirus crisis.
“Joe Biden will make strategic decisions and pursue them,” she said of her husband. “He’ll have the strategy and the foresight to make, you know, Americans well taken care of. This must be his number one precedence as president.”
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Shane Newell covers the latest news and cities of Palm Springs, Cathedral City and Desert Hot Springs in the west of the Coachella Valley. You can be contacted at [email protected], 760-778-4649 or on Twitter at @journoshane.