ADAMS ENDS BLAS Rx BIAS
More test sites opened after exposé
City health officials moved to open a slew of new coronavirus testing sites after a Post report last week showed how they were using race to decide how to allocate COVID testing resources.
City Council Minority Leader Joe Borelli — who represents the conservative and mostly white South Shore of Staten Island — credited Mayor Adams for swiftly addressing the problem.
“This was an error being committed by the de Blasio Department of Health and not necessarily one that is being continued in perpetuity by the Adams Department of Health,” Borelli told the Post.
The lawmaker gushed that city testing sites were now popping up all over his district and that he had already received a grateful message from Borough President Vito Fossella. The DOH could not immediately say how many new testing sites were opened.
Things have improved too for Democratic Councilman Bob Holden, who said his Middle Village district went weeks into the Omicron surge without a city testing facility. There’s now a testing site in his own office and another at the New Life Methodist Church in Woodhaven. But Holden still said things have not been moving fast enough.
‘We still need more’
“We need additional city testing sites, home test kits and PPE in my district immediately. We still do not have a commitment for a micro-site, nor do we even have mobile sites,” he said in a pleading letter to Mayor Adams on Friday. Adam Shrier, a spokesman for NYC Health + Hospitals, said the agency — which is in charge of testing, but works under Department of Health guidelines — said the agency has moved to rapidly expand testing facilities but could not say for sure how many new sites had gone up in the affected districts.
The city’s race-based policy came to light after reps for the city Department of Health and Mental
Hygiene told Borelli’s office that testing in his district had been slow-walked so the city could prioritize neighborhoods flagged by the city’s Taskforce on Racial Inclusion & Equity. The task force, created by the de Blasio administration in 2020, identified 31 neighborhoods to receive “priority” attention from the city.
The policy — and a similar one that considers race in the distribution of life-saving COVID treatments — has been widely criticized, including by doctors who say race does not biologically factor into COVID deaths.
“I was deeply disturbed to see New York City and state change guidelines to a race-based approach when deciding how to distribute and whom to administer these life-saving treatments,” Staten Island GOP Rep. Nicole Malliotakis said in a statement.
Sayville Assemblyman Jarett Gandolfo called the racial preferences “inhumane” and “un-American,” and sent a letter to state Health Commissioner Mary T. Bassett to demand new guidelines.
“Any law that discriminates against people based on immutable characteristics such as race should never be left to stand, but withholding treatments people need to live based on their race is especially despicable,” he said.
‘Race-based approach’