Scientific American Will COVID Force Public Health to Confront America’s Epic Inequality? In California’s San Joaquin Valley, some researchers are turning political to address the social determinants of health By: Nature, The Smithsonian, Nova/PBS and other outlets. Nature, The Smithsonian, Nova/PBS and other outlets. On a hazy day in November, Hardeep Singh received a text message from the COVID-19 testing system at Foster Farms poultry company saying that his mother had tested positive for the coronavirus. He got the alert because his mother, a 63-year-old line worker at one of the company’s meat-packing plants in California’s San Joaquin Valley, doesn’t speak English and doesn’t own a smartphone.