Group Of Black Women Doctors Bring Free COVID-19 Test Kits To Underserved Neighborhoods

Philadelphia, PA — Dr. Ala Stanford and oth­er African American doc­tors (most­ly women) from Pennsylvania have launched the Black Doctors COVID-19 Consortium to pro­vide free mobile coro­n­avirus test­ing to under­served com­mu­ni­ties in hopes to pre­vent fur­ther spread of the virus, espe­cial­ly among Black people.

Dr. Stanford, who is a pedi­atric sur­geon, owns a pri­vate prac­tice and a Black-owned med­ical con­sult­ing firm called REAL Concierge Medicine. She is also on staff at Abington-Jefferson Hospital in Hatfield Township. She says she launched the ini­tia­tive because she want­ed to do some­thing about the increas­ing num­bers of cas­es and deaths relat­ed to COVID-19 in com­mu­ni­ties where Afriacn Americans live.

Initially, she cre­at­ed and uploaded a video try­ing to dis­prove the myth that African Americans were resis­tant to COVID-19. But even though some were wor­ried that if they had the virus, they couldn’t get tested.

That’s when she decid­ed to form Black Doctors COVID-19 Consortium with her col­leagues in the med­ical field as well as church­es in the Black com­mu­ni­ties in Philadelphia. Having some test­ing kits on hand, Stanford and the oth­er doc­tors “put our sup­plies togeth­er and we went out to the com­mu­ni­ty,” she told WHYY.

Those who want to be test­ed can sign up for an appoint­ment online. The group is test­ing any­one, par­tic­u­lar­ly in under­served com­mu­ni­ties, who has coro­n­avirus symp­toms or known con­tact with some­one who test­ed positive.

They have set up a GoFundMe page to raise funds to pro­vide COVID-19 test­ing, advo­ca­cy, and edu­cate Black peo­ple about the coro­n­avirus dis­ease. It has so far raised more than $25,000 of its $50,000 goal.