As businesses in communities across Appalachia – and across the country – begin to reopen, Richard Besser has been vocal about the measures he feels should be met to counter the spread of COVID-19, most particularly, the disproportionate effect reopening too soon will have on underserved and marginalized communities. Besser […]
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Lesly-Marie Buer was living and working Colorado when she became interested in substance abuse treatment and harm reduction programs. Buer grew up in East Tennessee, in the Knoxville area, but moved west and attended the University of Colorado where she got a master’s in public health. “But then I was […]
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COVID-19 has forced Lou Ortenzio to assume a new role. “My new job,” Ortenzio, executive director of the Clarksburg Mission in Clarksburg, West Virginia, said, “is getting here in the morning, finding people clustered around and having to tell them, ‘You’ve gotta go.’” The mission offers emergency shelter to up […]
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At 8:15 every weekday morning, the Clarksburg Mission’s staff circles up their chairs to share gratitude. It’s generally thankfulness for something that happened within the past 24 hours, big or small– help from dorm residents in moving furniture, a kind word from a colleague, a new day. Desi Underwood, who […]
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Among those along the front lines in confronting COVID-19 are the nation’s federally supported community health centers. In West Virginia, 32 CHCs in some 400 locations throughout the state provide care for one in four residents. Sherri Ferrell, CEO of the West Virginia Primary Care Association, which represents the state’s […]
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Soledad Estrada-Castrejon felt self-conscious about her rosary. It wasn’t that anyone had said anything negative. Still, she wasn’t entirely comfortable clutching her beads and praying around people she didn’t know. Maria Alejandra Combs understood and offered Estrada-Castrejon reassurance. Estrada-Castrejon was born in Mexico; Combs in Venezuela– different cultures in many […]
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