Pandemic Inequities Illustrated
Covid-19 has taught us more lessons than we can count, not the least of which is how unevenly the pandemic has affected our community. Many families we serve do not have jobs that can be done from home. During the pandemic, these families found themselves in positions of constant exposure to the virus. In addition, many of our clients lost their jobs completely. Such was the case for Susanna, who lost her job early in the pandemic, but was at least able to be at home with her two girls when the stay-at-home orders were enacted.
Susanna’s daughters were regularly glued to the chrome books provided by their school. One of her girls, Charlotte, was really struggling because her glasses had broken and Medi-Cal would not replace them until June 2021, some eight months later. You can probably imagine Susanna’s sleepless nights, having no job and not enough money for rent, clothes, food and certainly not glasses.
When Young & Healthy learned of this family’s situation, we were able to arrange for school lunches and donations of clothing for the family and a precious pair of glasses for Charlotte. Hopefully, years from now, when that family recalls the awful times of the pandemic, they will also remember that there were people who cared about them and their unbelievable burdens. Young & Healthy cannot “fix” everything, but we can make our best effort to lighten the burden of poverty in any way that we can.
