Dr. Ala Sanford was infuriated. She and her colleagues were inundated with calls from Black people who couldn’t get COVID-19 tests - or even rides to drive-through testing sites.
Meanwhile, our COVID-19 death toll kept rising.
She and some other Black doctors had some COVID-19 tests. Fed up with the racist health system neglecting our people, they knew they had to put their resources together to help Black people affected by the pandemic!
What they did could change the game for their communities.
Dr. Sanford and colleagues formed the Black Doctor COVID-19 Consortium, and purchased a van to make house calls. They set up a fund to help pay for supplies, and got their medical students involved.
All so they could go out to the communities that could not get access to lifesaving COVID-19 help, setting up testing sites at Black churches and in communities! Thankfully they didn’t stop there.
They also set up a website for people to request testing, got more Black doctors and volunteers involved, and even bought testing kits from private vendors - all to save our people from annihilation.
The actions of these inspiring doctors has proven one thing.
When the system won’t take care of our people, we can come together for our survival! Together, there is nothing we cannot conquer - even a racist system intent on letting our people perish from a terrifying pandemic.