The Kresge Foundation has announced grants totaling $2.1 million in support of organizations and health departments across the country working to provide COVID-19 response and recovery services, boost vaccination rates, and address health disparities.

Investments include $822,773 to eighteen local health departments that participated in Kresge's Emerging Leaders in Public Health program, including the City of Pasadena Public Health Department in California; the Hennepin County Public Health in Minneapolis, Minnesota; the Lane County Public Health in Eugene, Oregon; the Oklahoma City-County Health Department in Oklahoma; and the Southwest District Health in Caldwell, Idaho. In addition, the foundation awarded $800,000 to Health Leads in support of its Vaccine Equity Cooperative, a two-year effort to ensure racial equity in COVID-19 vaccine distribution, build vaccine confidence, improve uptake, and address long-term disparities; $150,000 to Resilience Force to train and support community health workers to address the COVID-19 crisis in communities of color and provide career-track jobs to workers dislocated from the service and hospitality industries in New Orleans; and $335,000 to seven community organizations across Detroit in support of COVID-19 vaccine outreach and access efforts and to connect residents to a variety of basic needs. Recipients include Brilliant Detroit, Central Detroit Christian CDC, Cody Rouge Community Action Alliance CDC, GenesisHOPE CDC, Detroit Community Health Connection, Eastside Community Network and Institute for Population Health.

"This is still a perilous moment, particularly for those who are unvaccinated and for communities with low vaccination rates," said Detroit Program managing director Wendy Lewis Jackson. "It is incumbent on us to provide resources to the trusted organizations that are close to Detroit residents who still need vaccinations. It is the right thing to do for them and for the greater community as well."

(Photo credit: Institute for Population Health)