Leaked correspondence shows that New York City health officials use race to determine how COVID-19 testing kits should be distributed.
Staten Island’s South Shore neighborhood residents — made up of primarily white, middle-class people — were having trouble getting testing at city facilities. Despite having one of the highest COVID-19 case rates in the city, South Shore is not considered a priority neighborhood. The more diverse North Shore neighborhood is home to 13 city testing sites.
City Councilman Joe Borelli’s office reached out to the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene via email on December 22 to find out why.
“Our office has been receiving calls regarding the mobile NYC H+H testing sites such as Wolfes Pond Park,” Borelli staffer Briana Nasti wrote. “It appears many are waiting with delays, and are being turned away after waiting for hours.”
That same day, Nasti received a response stating the city’s Taskforce prioritizes neighborhoods on Racial Inclusion & Equity. The task force was created under former Mayor Bill de Blasio in 2020, identifying 31 underserved communities.
The areas were picked based on a DOHMH’s analysis of “health status, living conditions, social inequities, occupation, and COVID-19 Wave 1 impact.” However, the methodology has never been made public.
”The … DOHMH is committed to improving health outcomes for all New Yorkers by explicitly advancing racial equity and social justice. Racial equity does not mean simply treating everyone equally, but rather, allocating resources and services in such a way that explicitly addresses barriers imposed by structural racism (i.e., policies and institutional practices that perpetuate racial inequity) and White privilege,” a “Request for Proposals” from the DOHMH read, shedding some light into the agency’s viewpoint.
“I think we are clearly not on their racial and ethnic rubric priority list,” said Borelli to The New York Post. “There was no problem pointing fingers at the South Shore of Staten Island when it came to sending enforcement goons.”
Borelli believes the small businesses on the island were targets of strict mask and vaccine card enforcement.
Councilman Robert Holden of a Queens district is still without testing, despite the surge in the omicron variant. A few blocks away is Woodhaven, a task force designated neighborhood. Holden echoed the same sentiment as Borelli, claiming that de Blasio didn’t care about his district unless it was to fine small business owners.
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