Contributing Writers: Azad Ali, Tangerine Clarke,
George Alleyne, Nelson King,
Vinette K. Pryce, Bert Wilkinson
GENERAL INFORMATION (718) 260-2500
Caribbean L 10 ife, FEB. 26-MAR. 4, 2021
By Dr. Van Yu
The rollout of COVID-19
vaccines has been slow and
messy. Supplies have been
low, procedures have been
rigid and complicated, communications
have been inadequate
and contradictory,
and the threat of fines has
inhibited full utilization.
There are several categories
of people currently eligible
for vaccines, including those
over 65, healthcare workers,
teachers, individuals with
certain underlying conditions,
and people experiencing
homelessness and living
in shelters. For New Yorkers
who are experiencing homelessness,
there is an urgent
need for vaccination in order
to protect some of our most
vulnerable citizens who face
multiple obstacles to vaccination.
Here’s what we need to
take into consideration for
vaccinating our neighbors
experiencing homelessness.
As supplies expand, effectively
vaccinating New York
City’s homeless population
will require a commitment
to address both the logistical
challenge of getting arms
and vaccine in the same location
and also vaccine hesitancy.
Accomplishing this will
require multiple pathways,
including with providers who
are familiar with how to care
for individuals experiencing
homelessness — the campaign
must offer choice and
trust.
People who are homeless
suffer from a high burden of
conditions that make them
more susceptible to severe
COVID-19 and death while
facing many challenges to
accessing care. During the
height of the pandemic New
York City moved homeless
individuals from congregate
shelters into hotel rooms
where it is easier to maintain
social distancing, but there
are still congregate settings
in places like safe havens,
drop-in centers and church
bed programs that are at risk
of outbreaks.
A significant number of
people who are homeless and
living with serious mental
illness or chronic medical illness
do not access regular
clinical care in healthcare
settings. So, not surprisingly,
while the city has thus far
set up a vaccination Point of
Dispensing for shelters, it has
been a logistical challenge to
transport people there. More
access points are needed.
Healthcare for people who
are homeless is mostly provided
where people access
other services including at
shelters, safe havens, dropin
centers, and even outside.
The same approach will need
to be adopted to achieve a
high rate of vaccination—we
are going to have to vaccinate
people where they’re at
instead of counting on people
to come to the vaccine.
Since last summer, the
Department of Homeless
Services has had teams perform
COVID-19 tests and
offer flu vaccines at shelters
and safe havens. Pivoting this
kind of operation to COVID
vaccine administration could
reach people who can’t or
won’t make it to a mass vaccination
site. Even this effort,
however, was hampered by a
hesitancy to accept testing
or vaccine or both, and we
are not surprisingly encountering
hesitancy to accept
COVID vaccines.
People who are homeless
understandably prioritize
basic needs of shelter,
safety and food over healthcare.
But at the same time,
there can be a mistrust of
the medical establishment
and COVID vaccines in particular.
This mistrust is exacerbated
by a glaring racial
disparity among people who
are homeless in New York
City, with a nearly opposite
disparity among healthcare
providers. The Center for
Urban Community Services
(CUCS) healthcare providers
apply lessons of person-centered
care and harm reduction
to successfully outreach,
engage and nurture effective
healthcare relationships with
our patients. It is through
these relationships that people
accept care after years
of neglect, and it is through
these relationships that people’s
hesitancy will be softened.
If the vaccine is to
reach as widely as possible,
trusted community providers
must be enlisted and vaccines
will need to get into
the field.
Vaccines are not simply
medicine. The success of vaccine
campaigns also depends
on the relationship between
communities and authority.
Access can not only be determined
by the healthcare
infrastructure and storage
requirements, distribution
must also work for people
where they are. Acceptance
will not hinge on data and
goodwill, trusted partners
must be enlisted, or new
trust must be earned.
The well-being of our city
depends upon our commitment
to reach its most vulnerable.
Dr. Van Yu is the chief
medical officer at the Center
for Urban Community Services
(CUCS).
By Arthur Deakin
On Feb. 15, the government
of Guyana opened a public consultation
process for its local
content policy. Guyana is set to
become a top 20 global oil producer,
at 1.2 million barrels a
day by 2030, and this legislation
will set the stage for thousands
of local jobs.
The local content law is a
living policy, meaning that
its requirements evolve as the
industry develops. This allows
for the local citizenry to gradually
handle more work as they
gain more training and experience.
The construction of Floating
Production Storage and
Offloading (FPSOs) units, which
will be used for oil extraction in
the Stabroek block, is an example
of why local content policies
must adapt to the country’s
current reality. Although the
country may develop that expertise
down the road, Vice President
Bharrat Jagdeo warned
that “Guyana doesn’t have the
capacity to build FPSOs” at the
present moment.
Despite this, in Guyana’s local
content draft, the sliding scale
targets are set rather high for
a country with no oil and gas
precedence. Highly technical
parts of the industry, such as
front-end engineering and geophysical
services, have a 90 percent
local content requirement
within 10 years of the licensing
agreement. These jobs are
extremely complex and are hard
to fulfill with people from any
nationality. For Guyana to come
close to reaching such thresholds,
it would need to heavily
invest in developing an oil and
gas technical training institute.
Even then, it is unlikely to reach
those targets. Other areas that
don’t require extensive technical
training, such as unskilled
labor and catering, should keep
their 100 percent local content
thresholds.
Another discouraging sign
of the local content policy is
its minimum requirements for
joint venture ownership through
equity participation. A similar
rule is implemented in China,
where foreign companies are
prohibited from having majority
control and are often subject
to intellectual property theft.
Although China’s economic
prowess forces foreigners to
comply with the requirements,
Guyana does not have the size
to attract this type of compliance.
In free, capitalist markets
such as the United States, these
requirements do not exist.
It does appear that the draft
was somewhat rushed, or perhaps
overly optimistic, because
it even included certain targets
for the local provision of steel
plates and pipes. Guyana does
not manufacture any steel, and
it does not have plans to do so,
making it impossible for them to
comply with the requirements.
Jagdeo consented that those targets
should have not been set
and pledged that unrealistic provisions
would be amended.
To learn from its peers, Guyana
does not have to look far.
Brazil, its neighbor to the west,
initially jeopardized its pre-salt
oil production through its strict
local content rules.
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The challenge of offering vaccine to
people experiencing homelessness
Guyana should learn from
Brazil’s shortfalls in its
local content policy
A medical worker prepares to administer the Pfi zer-BioNTech
COVID-19 vaccine at a drive-through COVID-19
vaccination site at the Strawberry Festival Fairgrounds
in Plant City, Florida, U.S. January 13, 2021. REUTERS/
Octavio Jones, fi le