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dipulb3 · 4 years ago

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How to serve on MLK Day while quarantining at home

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How to serve on MLK Day while quarantining at home

Without the hassle of finding parking or forgetting your facemask at home, one way to spread goodwill on MLK Day is by making at-home care packages for those in need of cheer. Operation Gratitude is offering a number of virtual ways to spread joy to frontline workers and military members. With convenience in mind, this organization has set up an Amazon wish list through the Amazon Smile Program. After purchase, items like socks, sunscreen, and beef jerky are shipped to Operation Gratitude. From there, care packages are assembled and sent to those on the front lines.

“Volunteers are the heart and soul of Operation Gratitude,” says Danielle Teconi, the organization’s communications director.

“Anyone, from anywhere, can participate from home, as it’s self-guided and self-paced,” she explains.

As an added perk, eligible purchases made through the organization’s wish list will kick back a small donation to the charity.

For crafty volunteers, Operation Gratitude also offers a step-by-step guide on how to make eye-catching letters of gratitude for military personnel and essential workers.

And, for those who sew, volunteers can lend their talents on MLK Day to create knitted crafts as a part of the organization’s Hand Made with Love initiative. Soft keepsakes like crochet hats, scarves and handmade bags can cheer up deployed troops when home feels far away.

Teaching and learning opportunities

This year’s day of service provides a timely opportunity to learn about existing public health disparities made worse for communities of color by Covid-19. In honor of Dr. King’s commitment to public health access, Global Citizen 365 is hosting a national conversation on “Justice and the Covid-19 Health Crisis.” The online event will take place via Zoom at 3 pm Eastern on Martin Luther King Day.

To teach the next generation of change agents, the organization is hosting a virtual read-aloud recording. Global Citizen 365 is seeking volunteers willing to film an animated selfie-video. Those interested are asked to record themselves reading a children’s book about the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., civil rights or civic engagement. Once submitted, the non-profit will post the videos online and share them with families.

Helping to sustain life

At a time when so many people are in pain, you can sustain life.

To learn where to donate blood, enter your zip code into the search tool set up by the American Red Cross. According to its website, the American Red Cross has a special need for donations from fully-recovered coronavirus survivors. Those who have fully recovered from the virus are urged to consider donating convalescent plasma. The convalescent plasma of fully recovered coronavirus survivors may contain antibodies helpful to critically ill Covid patients.

Another way to help sustain life on MLK Day is by volunteering to become a bone marrow donor with Be The Match. Bone marrow donations can save the lives of individuals battling blood cancers like leukemia and lymphoma, as well as blood disorders like sickle cell disease. Be The Match has an urgent plea for donations from communities of color—especially Black and African-American individuals. Of the organization’s more than 22 million member registry, only 4% identify as Black or African American.

Due to the lack of representation, Be The Match says Black and African American patients are among the least likely to find a match. According to Kate McDermott, a public relations specialist at the organization, Black and African-American people only have a 23% chance of finding a suitable donor.

“That number is unacceptable to us. We want to make sure that all of our patients regardless of ethnic background are able to find the match that they need,” she tells Appradab. “Our mission is equal outcomes for all.”

To encourage life-saving donations, Be The Match says it has created the Race Against Time campaign to urge communities of color to come forward to help sustain lives of color impacted by blood-related diseases.

Giving Companionship

As the pandemic forced people to prioritize physical health over mental wellness, many elderly citizens have suffered in silence. Programs like the Selfhelp’s Virtual Senior Center program are seeking volunteers eager to share meaningful moments and smiles with seniors. At-home volunteers are needed to facilitate hour-long virtual classes for their senior students based on interests, hobbies and expertise. Classes are diverse, covering topics like cooking, birding, seated exercise, art and music history. Selfhelp says it operates the oldest and largest program providing comprehensive services to Holocaust survivors in North America. It provides a special platform to accommodate the unique needs of these users as well.

“Just as the Virtual Senior Center offers emotional and physical health benefits to participants, volunteer facilitators become part of our community and learn from our clients as well,” says Sandy Myers from Selfhelp Community Services. “We’ve learned the importance of strong online communities and are grateful for the work of our volunteers to make the VSC a vibrant community, especially throughout Covid.”

Although based in New York, Selfhelp’s virtual senior center is growing nationally. The team welcomes volunteers and senior students from across the country. And if individuals are interested in learning how to bring a virtual senior center to their neighborhood, Selfhelp can help.

Commemorating Dr. King’s Legacy

To learn more about the life of Dr. King and how to honor his legacy, The King Center is hosting its online Beloved Community Commemorative Service to honor the late global civil rights icon. The event will stream virtually on the organization’s webpage and Facebook account at 10:30 a.m. Eastern Time. The service will feature a keynote address from Bishop T.D. Jakes of The Potter’s House Church in Texas.

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gordonwilliamsweb · 4 years ago

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Seniors In Low-Income Housing Live In Fear Of COVID Infection

Davetta Brooks, 75, who has heart failure, a fractured hip and macular degeneration, is afraid. Conditions in her low-income senior building on Chicago’s Near West Side — the Congressman George W. Collins Apartments — are “deplorable,” she said.

Residents are not wearing masks or gloves to guard against the coronavirus, she said: “They’re touching everything on the elevator, in the laundry room. And anybody and everybody’s relatives and friends are coming in and out with no scrutiny.”

No one is checking on residents to see if they need help, Brooks said. And no one seems to know whether residents have tested positive for COVID-19 or died, though ambulances have screeched up to the entrance several times.

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“This building is not safe,” she said in mid-June. “With all the things happening in the U.S., this is what ‘seniors lives don’t matter’ looks like.”

Nationwide, more than 1.6 million older adults live in low-income housing subsidized by the Department of Housing and Urban Development — most in apartment buildings with shared common spaces, elevators, staircases, mailrooms, hallways and laundry rooms where the coronavirus might lurk.

Most of these seniors have endured a life of disadvantage, have chronic illnesses such as diabetes and heart disease, and lack financial reserves to draw upon.

Yet in the midst of the pandemic, this population — the age group deemed most at risk of becoming critically ill and dying — has largely been overlooked.

“This is a moment when we really should be pushing assistance and guidance toward these senior communities, but we’re not,” said Linda Couch, vice president of housing for LeadingAge, an association that represents nonprofit senior housing and long-term care providers. “No one is watching over what’s happening.”

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Nationally there is no data on COVID-19’s spread in low-income housing. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is not collecting it or requiring states to do so. The same is true of HUD and state and local housing agencies: This is “independent living,” and operators are not expected to monitor the health of residents.

Low-income housing operators find out about COVID cases only when residents or family members volunteer the information. For the most part, systematic testing is not done. A rare exception: Gov. Andrew Cuomo in mid-May announced plans to bring coronavirus testing to 40 public housing developments in New York.

“Without testing, there’s no way of knowing how many people have the virus,” said Michael Kane, executive director of the National Alliance of HUD Tenants. “Our concern is that there could be a transmission danger similar to what’s going on in nursing homes or assisted living.”

“People are dying all over in these buildings, and we don’t know what they’re dying from,” said Geraldine Collins, president of the National Alliance of HUD Tenants.

The situation in Chicago highlights how difficult it is to gauge the extent to which people in these settings are at risk. Although the Chicago health department requires “congregate living facilities,” including senior housing complexes, to report two or more confirmed COVID cases that occur within 14 days, it has not made that data publicly available. So there is no way of tracking where the virus is spreading.

The Chicago Housing Authority, which operates 55 buildings with 9,500 senior residents, “is not required to track or verify cases and, due to privacy issues, we do not inquire about the health status of residents,” the agency said in a statement.

At the federal level, HUD’s emergency preparedness plans did not incorporate infectious disease control and its guidance to housing operators was spotty in the pandemic’s early stages. Building managers were not required to notify residents of a COVID case.

Recently, HUD has come out more strongly on the side of transparency. On May 21, HUD said that multifamily housing management should, “in coordination with local health officials, communicate the possible COVID-19 exposure to all residents and workers, volunteers and visitors.”

On health concerns, HUD has deferred to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which in March issued recommendations for preventing the spread of COVID-19 in retirement communities and independent living facilities.

Those include canceling group activities; informing residents, workers and visitors about COVID-19; stepping up cleaning and disinfecting; screening people coming into buildings; and limiting visitors.

Very little of that was happening in Chicago buildings for low-income seniors, according to Lori Clark, executive director of the Jane Addams Senior Caucus, which has close to 700 members.

When the organization called members in mid-March, “we started to hear awful stories,” Clark said. Residents reported getting no information about how to stay safe. No one was checking who was going in and out. Buildings were understaffed as workers stayed home.

At the Elizabeth Woods Apartments, a senior building operated by the Chicago Housing Authority, “we felt abandoned,” said Carmen Betances, 68. “They did no cleaning, and they did not prepare the property for the invisible enemy that has now taken over. They gave us no information about what to do.”

“I am a target for coronavirus: I am a senior. I’m asthmatic. I have a compromised immune system,” Betances said. “Every breath I take, I take with fear, worrying that I could die from this invisible monster.”

At the end of March, Betances and other residents began using their own cleaning supplies to disinfect the handles of every door in the six-story apartment building twice a day. They wiped down water fountains, counters in the lobby, chairs and tables in the community room as well as vending and laundry machines.

Older adults like Davetta Brooks are at high risk of becoming critically ill from the coronavirus, according to federal guidance. Davetta lives at the Congressman George W. Collins Apartments, a low-income building for seniors on Chicago’s Near West Side, where she says health conditions are “deplorable.” (Nolis Anderson for KHN)

On May 20, the housing authority said in a statement it is making more than 3,000 calls daily to check in on older residents, requiring property management firms to clean and disinfect common areas three times a day, and distributing information about Chicago’s six new coronavirus testing sites.

The complex where Brooks lives is privately operated. Its operations were taken over April 1 by WinnResidential, the nation’s largest manager of affordable housing.

“The immediate priority during this transition has been to protect the health and safety of the residents,” wrote Ed Cafasso, senior vice president of WinnCompanies, which owns WinnResidential. He said the complex was now being cleaned several times a day.

Cafasso said the company has helped tens of thousands of older residents at 520 properties obtain meals, groceries, household supplies and masks; renew prescriptions; and access telehealth.

Food assistance is a pressing need, because people cannot get hot meals at community centers and many are afraid to go to grocery stores.

Also needed: help using technology, and better internet connections so seniors can participate in telehealth and virtual interactions with friends and family, easing their loneliness as stay-at-home orders remain in place. Most federally subsidized senior housing lacks building-wide Wi-Fi.

Going into the pandemic, some housing operators were better equipped to respond. In and around New York City, Selfhelp Community Services runs 11 low-income senior buildings with 1,400 residents. Social workers have identified vulnerable residents at the buildings and have stayed in contact with them, said Mohini Mishra, a management director.

“If someone is coming home from the hospital, we try to check in with family members,” Mishra said. “Will they need home care? Do they understand what self-quarantine means?”

Across seven of Selfhelp’s buildings, there had been 20 confirmed cases of COVID-19 among residents and 12 people had died as of June 10.

At the Paul G. Stewart Center apartments in Chicago, officials called in the police after the first resident found to have COVID-19 in mid-March refused to stay in their apartment.

“We reiterated the guidelines of the CDC and the Chicago and Illinois health department[s],” said Shawn Person, chief operations officer of the South Side campus, which houses about 1,300 residents. “But this person refused to listen. We had to do something.” As of June 10, she said, 10 residents had tested positive and two had passed away.

The complex is participating in a federal pilot project that brings nurses into senior housing to help evaluate residents’ needs.

But there’s only so much they can do. “There’s a store in this building, and nobody practices true social distancing there,” said Shirley Moore, 71, who lives in an apartment tower on the campus, has COVID-19 and is not sure how she became infected.

Her 72-year-old husband has a much worse case of COVID-19 than she does, she said. He had been in intensive care for three weeks as of June 10, including eight days on a ventilator, she said, and early on doctors told her they did not think he would survive.

“You go up in the elevators, you’re bringing garbage to the garbage chute, you’re grabbing a guardrail in the hall,” she said. “Even if there’s been cleaning, people still will be touching all these places in between.”

As for what she would like to see happen, Moore said, “I think they should be testing. I’m sure if you tested everyone in this building, you’d come up with a lot of COVID-19.”

Seniors In Low-Income Housing Live In Fear Of COVID Infection published first on https://nootropicspowdersupplier.tumblr.com/

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stephenmccull · 4 years ago