Healthcare Anchor Network member Kaiser Permanente has committed $63 million to support contact tracing in California that will involve partnering with the Public Health Institute to hire and train 500 full-time residents from the hardest hit communities to be contract tracers. In addition to a quality job, the program will be positioning these individuals for ongoing employment with training and long-term career support. The funding will also connect Californians in self-imposed isolation and quarantine with supportive services to help with essentials needs such as food, housing, and medicine.
In an article in the Orange County Register, Mary Pittman, DrPH, president and CEO of the Public Health Institute, shares how this will connect community residents with support:
“Kaiser Permanente’s support will allow us to initiate a rapid response network that can slow the spread of COVID-19. With teams based right within a clinic, we can offer support to people from the moment they realize they may have been exposed. And because we are focusing on hiring from within the community, they’ll be getting information and resources from people they trust, in the language they are most comfortable speaking.”