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Promising Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities, and are suitable for adaptation by other communities.
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Summary Report/Recommendations
This series of case studies examines nine communities (in Kansas, Texas, Wisconsin, Alabama, New Mexico, Washington, Michigan, Florida, and New York) to understand the impacts of COVID-19 on community members and local mitigation efforts. The case studies offer examples of lessons learned from these nine communities related to health, economic response, in-person schooling, and affordable housing. Practices that were shown to be successful in these communities include using operational equity plan to allocate resources, engaging community members in decision making, and building cross-sector relationships between businesses, government, and non-profits for increased collaboration and information sharing.
Promising Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities, and are suitable for adaptation by other communities.
RELEASE DATE:
Summary Report/Recommendations
This report outlines the catalyzing conditions for sustaining healthy communities, with the central premise being community power-building approaches. Public health partners can use this roadmap to build community power, which includes setting agendas, changing public discourse, building relationships with decision makers, and creating governance structures. The report also highlights sixteen community power-building efforts across the United States.
Emerging Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and produce early results that are consistent with the objectives of the activities and thus indicate effectiveness.
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Summary Report/Recommendations
This report recommends changing work policies to support employee wellness at public health agencies. Public health infrastructure is often hard to maintain due to high turnover and burnout, especially during times of crisis like COVID-19. Work policies such as flexible schedules and remote work have been shown to increase employee well-being. It also recommends the establishment of cross-jurisdictional sharing arrangements to share key staff between public health departments, e.g., epidemiologists. This can serve as a solution to chronic underfunding of public health agencies at the federal level.
Novel Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and are in the process of generating evidence of effectiveness or may not yet be tested.
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White Paper/Brief
This article details how the Rhode Island Department of Health built its community-level COVID-19 response from existing capacities and networks through its Health Equity Zone Initiative. The initiative is a place-based, community-level model that brings a range of community members together to address pressing health issues and build capacity for systemic changes surrounding the social determinants of health. The state has used federal pandemic relief funds to expand the Health Equity Zone Initiative by providing resources to community partners, social service agencies, and grassroots organizations to be engaged in the pandemic response. The initiative’s partners provided critical community-based services including COVID-19 testing and vaccination sites, quarantine and isolation supports, distribution of masks and other personal protective equipment, and direct outreach and education by community health workers and community outreach specialists.
Novel Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and are in the process of generating evidence of effectiveness or may not yet be tested.
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White Paper/Brief
This article describes how the Pennsylvania Department of Health’s Health Equity Response Team, which is made up of more than 100 community partners, helps implement recommendations from the task force. The team meets every two weeks to address health inequities associated with COVID-19. Over the past 18 months the team has led initiatives to serve vulnerable populations. Initiatives such as faith-based vaccine sites, immigrant testing access, mobile community testing options, and agricultural worker testing bolstered the department’s response to COVID-19. The team facilitated community partnerships that drove personal protection equipment distribution, investigation of improved paid sick family/medical leave options, and the digital clemency process in the corrections field. The team also spawned the department’s efforts around improved race and ethnicity data enrichment, assessment, and reporting improvements.
Novel Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and are in the process of generating evidence of effectiveness or may not yet be tested.
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White Paper/Brief
This article describes how Virginia collected and reported data to inform COVID-19 response efforts and decisions. Virginia officials noted a hallmark of Virginia’s success has been the focus on data strategies and mapping techniques to identify COVID-19 testing, vaccination, and resource allocation priorities. For example, the working group used geospatial data to inform the distribution process for a personal protective equipment (PPE) pilot program that successfully distributed more than two million units of PPE across 66 local governments. The task force uses data stratified by race and ethnicity, medical vulnerability, and other social and environmental factors to identify locations for community engagement, outreach, testing, and vaccination clinics. The task force also launched two equity dashboards to provide a transparent measurement of ways COVID-19 resources have been allocated and equity gaps across various social determinants of health identified in Virginia House Joint Resolution 537.
Novel Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and are in the process of generating evidence of effectiveness or may not yet be tested.
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White Paper/Brief
This article describes how Wisconsin is implementing a Just Recovery Framework. It is a task force focused on recommendations for a fair and just recovery from the pandemic and embedding racial and rural equity in future emergency preparedness infrastructure. The task force reviewed existing literature and research and developed a strategic plan, including evidence-based policy and practice interventions to support just recovery after COVID-19. This plan offers practical guidance for local and state officials to address the pandemic and existing inequities exacerbated by the pandemic along the lines of racial equity, rural equity and worker health.
Novel Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and are in the process of generating evidence of effectiveness or may not yet be tested.
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Summary Report/Recommendations
This article outlines the policies gathered and supported by Massachusetts’ Task Force on Coronavirus and Equity, including ensuring housing security, securing worker rights, demanding police accountability, applying data collection, and planning for equity.
Novel Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and are in the process of generating evidence of effectiveness or may not yet be tested.
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White Paper/Brief
This brief outlines The Public Health Alliance of Southern California’s priority areas for elevating public health & equity in the COVID-19 response. This includes outlining what is needed in infrastructure, health and safety, economic security, food security, housing stability, and data.
Promising Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities, and are suitable for adaptation by other communities.
RELEASE DATE:
Summary Report/Recommendations
This case study describes the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s (CDPHE) work to change the narrative and framing of population health data to emphasize the importance of structural inequities and social determinants of health. CDPHE is also working to incorporate equity metrics into program evaluations and performance monitoring and use boilerplate language regarding equity in CDPHE publications.