Exposure On The Streets: Healthcare Workers Fight Spread Of Virus In Homeless

Valley Medical Center's mobile healthcare unit provides services to homeless
Photo credit Santa Clara Valley Medical Center
In our new series “Exposure on the Streets”, KCBS Radio takes a closer look at the magnified risks facing the Bay Area’s homeless residents during this pandemic and what is being done to keep them safe. Part One looked at what the unhoused are doing to protect themselves. Part Two looked at the community advocates working overtime to maintain services.
Today in Part Three, KCBS Radio reporter Keith Menconi tells us about the medical personnel fighting the spread of the illness in the Bay Area’s homeless shelters and encampments.

“You’re gone and nobody notices you’re gone? That you’re sick? That’s what’s scary,” said one unhoused resident, of her fear that she and others in her community might slip through the cracks during this pandemic. “We’re afraid of that aspect, that we’re not going to get help because we’re homeless.”

So as California prepared for a surge in cases, it wasn’t just hospitals that saw a boost in capacity. 

“We’re using other staff and training them to work with us during this crisis,” says Christine Tyler. She is a nurse with the Valley Homeless Healthcare Program, which is run by the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center. Her team of doctors and nurses has been providing medical assistance to Santa Clara County’s homeless for years. 

But since the pandemic began their work has been picking up pace and adding new tasks including screening and testing the homeless for coronavirus.

“We’re out there, we’re going to take our COVID MMU (Mobile Medical Unit), we’re going to take our backpack team and we’re going to go test everybody that needs to be tested,” says Tyler. 

And there are many other medical needs as well. Cities and counties have been rushing to move those who are infected or medically vulnerable out of shelters and encampments and into more secure settings like hotel rooms, and trained medical personnel are needed every step of the way to identify those most in need and provide support to those who have been transferred.

“It’s a lot of coordination,” says Dr. Todd Fong with VMC’s homeless healthcare program. “It’s the first time we’ve done anything like this, so you can imagine how difficult that must be. And so every day is kind of a new set of challenges.”

The need for this type of work is profound, as the homeless are often vulnerable to the virus in multiple ways. 

“I would say almost everyone that steps into the clinic has some type of chronic illness,” says Dr. Fong.

But the urgency of making this all work was highlighted in recent days, with the news of a major coronavirus outbreak at a San Francisco homeless shelter that resulted in 102 new cases, prompting some to question whether this work is being treated with the urgency it deserves. 

We’ll look for some answers in Part Four of “Exposure on the Streets”.