NH75OT000037

Rhode Island Initiative to Address COVID-19 Health Disparities - On behalf of the Rhode Island Department of Health (RIDOH), the RIDOH Health Equity Institute is submitting this proposal in response to CDC-RFA-OT21-2103. RIDOH will use the resources from this funding opportunity to significantly enhance the state of Rhode Island's ability to:

1) Respond to COVID-19 related health disparities by supporting ongoing community mitigation efforts in our hardest-hit communities; establishing a mobile integrated health/community paramedicine program in coordination with RI's EMS providers; establishing new and enhancing existing partnerships with congregate housing to augment testing and vaccination; and expanding community mitigation capacity in our designated rural community, Block Island.

2) Identify disparities related to COVID-19 and other public health and social determinants indicators by applying lessons learned with COVID response to other essential epidemiological processes; significantly overhauling and improving our race and ethnicity data at points of collection; and improving our ability to provide actionable data to identify and address disparities, thus driving measurable change within the priority populations identified in our workplan.

3) Build systemic solutions to mitigate current and future public health disparities by investing in the expansion of RIDOH's Health Equity Institute; establishing a Community Response, Recovery, and Resilience (CR?) team; establishing an Equity Policy team responsible for convening multi-sector coalitions to develop actionable recommendations for addressing policies, systems, and/or structures that perpetuate and/or exacerbate disparities and inequality; and establishing an Equity Training and Professional Development team to cross-train all RIDOH personnel on health equity and provide opportunities for professional development to strive towards greater equity in operation. Additionally, enhancing overall capacity for operational equity through new project and program management staff; supporting enhanced capacity in our Center for Health Facilities Regulation to ensure adequate oversight of long-term care facilities to address significant disparities in impact for our long-term care population; supporting the development of a sustainability plan to ensure these time-limited resources support ongoing health equity infrastructure; and establishing and developing equitable response, recovery, and resilience plans in partnership with all local emergency management agencies to mitigate disparities in future emergency response efforts.

4) Operationalize community-based strategies to address persistent disparities in the prevalence and severity of COVID-19's direct and indirect impacts by continuing to support and enhance RIDOH's COVID community mitigation strategies implemented in partnership with our Health Equity Zones (HEZ); expanding the reach of the community-led HEZ infrastructure in additional communities; establishing a new equity initiative that will provide resources to demographically-aligned communities to replicate the HEZ equity model in the target populations of this NOFO who have been most disproportionately impacted by historical marginalization and the COVID pandemic; and bolstering existing community-led efforts to encourage vaccination in priority populations by establishing new grassroots community communications campaigns and bolstering existing efforts to engage community leaders as trusted voices within the community. Additionally, establishing a program for healthcare and oral healthcare providers to receive continuing medical education/continuing education credits for attending trainings in culturally and linguistically appropriate services (CLAS) compliance; and implementing an initiative to partner with community health workers to promote engagement with oral health providers in communities disproportionately impacted by COVID who have seen a dramatic decline in utilization of oral health services.

Please note that the text has been properly cased and organized into paragraphs for better readability.

Rhode Island Department Of Health

NOT APPLICABLE

93.354 - Public Health Emergency Response: Cooperative Agreement for Emergency Response: Public Health Crisis Response

CDC Office of Financial Resources (OFR) [HHS - CDC]

Center for State, Tribal, Local, and Territorial Support (CSTLTS) [HHS - CDC]

Rhode Island United States

State-Wide

National Initiative to Address COVID-19 Health Disparities Among Populations at High-Risk and Underserved, Including Racial and Ethnic Minority Populations and Rural Communities (CDC-RFA-OT21-2103)

Amendment Since initial award the End Date has been extended from 05/31/23 to 05/31/25.