inconceivable. medical contributor dr. uché blackstock is the founder and ceo of advancing health equity. dr. blackstock, thank you so much for being here. i m desperate to know what you want to hear from the president on tuesday. alicia, i need the president to be bold and courageous and innovative this tuesday. we heard so much about a very vaccine-centric strategy, and we need a plan that will involve layered mitigation, which we talk about so much. we need him to use his bully pulpit to encourage all states to have indoor mask mandates. we need him to make rapid testing even more accessible to people so they don t have to go through their insurance companies. we need him to talk about how he s going to make the testing infrastructure more robust. we also need to hear how he s going to set ventilation and air infiltration standards for
testing even more accessible to people so they don t have to go through their insurance companies. we need him to talk about how he s going to make the testing infrastructure more robust. we also need to hear how he s going to set ventilation and air infiltration standards for businesses and schools and how he s going to close the gap in terms of vaccination rates because we re still seeing the same inequities we saw at the beginning of the vaccine rollout. we re now seeing with boosters in terms of racial inequities and socioeconomic equities and how we re going to keep workplaces safe as well. i want to hear a layered strategy approach. it cannot be vaccine focused because as we ve seen, we had as many people die since the vaccine rollout since before the vaccine rollout. for those of you who don t follow dr. blackstock on instagram and twitter, she s very generous about sharing her personal interactions on those platforms. dr. blackstock, i was really
even vaccine immunity. it could dominate delta or co-exist with delta. i m concerned in the next few weeks or months we re going to see another surge. the question is how big is that surge going to be? we really need a collective response at this point. we need all of those layers of mitigation that work well. not just vaccinations or people getting their boosters, but rapid testing in homes, making it free and accessible. not involved insurance companies because that s another barrier for folks but focusing on efforts, air infiltration in homes and schools that needs some work as well. with delta alone, cases are going up. that new variant tearing through other parts of the world includes the united kingdom. some really tough numbers coming out thereof as well. dr. blackstock, i want to
pierces the immunity by vaccination. so assuming that doesn t happen, and i think it s unlikely, this will be the last major wave. this becomes a more systemic endemic risk. you have spread but not at the same rate as it is right now. it settles into more of a seasonal pattern and becomes a seasonal flu, something on par with the flu. the challenges that we already have with flu, and if we have covid circulating, the cumulative death and disease is going to be too much for society to bear. we will have to do things differently in the wintertime to cut down on the risk of things like work and schools, improving air quality in indoor spaces, air infiltration, putting in place hand washing stations, encouraging hand washing stations, wearing masks voluntarily in public spaces during peak covid and flu