Every day, Luizilda "Lucy" de Oliveira, La Clinica's Director of Nursing and Care Management, leaves her mom at home to start her day at our clinic in DC. Since the stay-at-home order went into effect, Lucy has changed her routine. She is now deemed an essential worker and must take extra precautions to keep herself, her team, her patients, and her mom safe. Her ten minute commute through the city, now paints a vivid picture of the impact COVID-19 is having on our community, she can see the back story of every patient. For some who have lost their jobs, they wait in long food distribution lines struggling to feed their families. Others with COVID like symptoms are told to wait and see how their symptoms evolve because there just aren't enough tests to go around for all. And, still others are full of pain and grief from losing a family member to COVID or anxiously waiting for one to recover.

Lucy shares, "when I look at the numbers and who is dying, they look a lot like me, they look a lot like the patients we are serving here at La Clinica. It's unacceptable that our zipcodes during this pandemic are determining our survivors. It breaks my heart to see that our community is being affected so gravely. I see the role La Clinica plays and I feel more certain than ever that we are never overdoing it, repetition is key, reaching out to our patients is key, being present is key."

At La Clinica we are doing everything we can to stop the spread of the virus and keep our community safe and healthy. Help from your Home

to help us respond to COVID's impact on the Latino community and the evolving needs ahead.