February 22, 2023 • 33 mins
Erica Tavares with International Medical Corps joins us to discuss critical gaps in California’s healthcare system, and how her organization is helping victims in both the Syria/Turkey earthquake as well as Ukraine.
(Originally aired 22Feb23)
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S1 (00:00):
The views and opinions expressed in this program are those
of the Speaker's and do not necessarily reflect the views
or positions of any entities they represent, including allies. OLAS Media.
Bryan (00:12):
OLAS Media Presents Nation State of play. Welcome to the
(00:38):
Nation State of Play podcast. I'm your host, Bryan Miller.
And each episode we explore the political stories that are
driving public policy in California. We explore these stories with
political insiders, business leaders, journalists and policymakers themselves to get
below the surface of the headlines and show you the
true forces shaping our nation's state. Thanks for listening. We
have a great guest Erica Tavares with International Medical Corps.
(01:01):
Discussion covers some issues close to home and the refugee perspective,
but also some international issues that are very high profile
in the news right now. So it's an amazing organization.
They do incredible work both here and abroad, and glad
to have this chance to bring some of those issues
to your attention. Hope you'll find a way to learn
more about the organization and we'll put all the links
to them in the show notes. So. Erika Tavarez with
(01:24):
the International Medical Corps coming up right after this.
Erica (01:28):
Listen to our weekly podcast. How to Win Friends and
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UU (01:47):
Welcome back to the
Bryan (01:48):
Nation's State of Play podcast. Erica, thanks so much for
being on the show today. It is a pleasure to
have you.
Erica (01:54):
Thank you so much for having me here.
Bryan (01:55):
Can you maybe start by just giving a little bit
of an overview of your organization, who you are and
what you focus on at a at a global scale?
Erica (02:03):
Sure. International Medical Corps is a disaster response and health
care organization. We have been responding to disasters and crises
around the world for the last almost 40 years. We
define disasters pretty broadly. It includes natural disasters, but also
disease outbreaks like COVID 19 also includes conflict, conflict and wars.
(02:26):
And so we do also respond when there is a
crisis providing emergency response, bringing people health care and health
related services. And then we're committed to staying. We invest
in health care systems. We partner with the countries where
we work, we partner with communities and the health systems
on the ground to help them recover and build back
better so that the health care system we're leaving behind
(02:48):
can continue to provide services to the communities that need
it most.
Bryan (02:53):
What's great. And based here in California.
Erica (02:56):
We are based here in California. We were founded in
1984 by an emergency room doctor, Dr. Bob Simon, who
worked at UCLA. He went to Pakistan to work with
refugees who had fled Afghanistan and very quickly realized you
could never bring in enough doctors to provide the care
that was needed. And so really started launching training programs.
(03:18):
And it was really from from there that the organization grew.
We were very early on looking to go into places
where we could provide training so that local doctors could
be able to take care of their own communities.
Bryan (03:30):
So I want to talk about a few issues. One
costs and then and then global stuff. But let's talk
about California first. So I know you're working in Los
Angeles and in particular. So could you give us a
little bit of overview of what you're doing here in
California right now?
Erica (03:44):
Sure. So for a long part of our history, International
Medical Corps was focused almost exclusively internationally. Since 2005, we've
done some work in the U.S. responding to disasters. But
it was really after the COVID 19 outbreak where we
grew our U.S. response fairly significantly, including in California, that
(04:06):
we realized that really there are some of the challenges
that that individuals and communities face. Accessing health care in
the U.S. is just as challenging or just as difficult
as anywhere where we work in the world. I think
it's it's no secret that COVID 19 outbreak, I think,
exposed a lot of the gaps in our own health
care system here at home, which some of the limitations.
(04:27):
And and in California, we worked with our 15 hospitals,
51 long term health care facilities for elderly patients, really
providing training, medical surge, staffing and extra space. We set
up mobile hospitals and mobile units so that we could
expand the capacity of the health care system to provide
(04:47):
care when it was needed most. Since that time, we've
continued to work very closely, particularly with Los Angeles County,
but also with the state, to really figure out what
other gaps we might be able to fill. We've provided
some training to health facilities that are in the Central
Valley around wildfire preparedness. And now I'm here in Los
(05:08):
Angeles this week and really working with our partners to
launch a program to help provide additional health care to
people living in transitional shelters, knowing that making sure that
people who are experiencing homelessness have access to health care.
We're trying to innovate and partner to figure out how
we can maybe keep some people out of the emergency rooms,
(05:28):
provide them care where where they are, and reconnect them
to their doctors. So, again, really partnering with the health
care system to try and make it stronger and work better.
Bryan (05:37):
But yeah, it's that's we love talking about local issues
when when we can on this focus when we're talking
about L.A. County by county is bigger than 37 states
in this country. So I think anything that happens at
a county level level there is just enormously important in
terms of the number of people it impacts. So so yeah,
let's let's dig into that a little bit more. It
sounds like you're working actually with the county directly on
(06:00):
these issues right now.
Erica (06:02):
We're coordinating with the county directly. We partner directly, though,
with other nonprofit organizations. So organizations that are running shelters.
And we've worked with the Los Angeles County Department of Health.
We've worked with our Housing Services Authority to keep them
up to date on what we're doing. In this case,
we've actually mobilized private resources, resources from foundations, private sector donors,
(06:26):
individuals to pilot this initiative and to really kind of
get in there, work very closely with our nonprofit partner
to test this model to see if we can provide
health care to where people are and really work with
them on a very 1 to 1 basis to reconnect
them to their doctor. If we can get people who
are experiencing homelessness back into kind of the health care
(06:47):
system and again, keeping them out of the emergency rooms
or further taxing the kind of emergency response portion of
health care here. The state has.
Bryan (06:56):
Invested a lot in recent years in homelessness. Is this
is this particular I haven't heard that this particular aspect
of the issue before. So I'm really glad you're talking
about this of health care for homeless. We talk a
lot about housing on this show and a lot of
state initiatives on that. Has there been any state initiatives
on this particular aspect of it that you're focused on?
Erica (07:17):
I'm not as familiar with what's happening at the state level,
but we're really looking at what's happening right now at
the local level and at the county level. And we've
talked with a lot of the providers who are working
in this space. And really an international medical corps approach
is really to kind of come in and see where
we can fill gaps. And so we you know, we
know we don't have all the solutions to this. It's
(07:39):
a large problem. There's lots of different facets to it.
But but we heard from partners on the ground, from
nonprofit organizations, that there there was a gap in providing
health care in shelters and that. People were asking for it.
And this is where we really try to take an
approach to say, okay, people are here in shelters. They
(08:00):
are asking for health care, they're expressing health care needs.
There is distrust of the health care system among some
of these populations. And so the approach here is to
take a very individualized approach to kind of have clinical doctors,
nurses who can work one on one with clients, with
caseworkers at the shelters to really kind of shepherd individuals
(08:23):
through our health care system is incredibly complex. It's even
more complex if you don't have the resources to be
able to navigate it. And so really helping people kind
of navigate in this one on one and reconnect them
is what we're trying to achieve here. And it is
what we heard from partners on the ground. That was
a real gap. There are, you know, teams providing medicine,
(08:43):
you know, street medicine teams or certainly emergency rooms that
are providing a lot of care. But how could we
again go where people are and where they're asking for
services and meet them at that place?
Bryan (08:53):
And then you actually have doctors and other health care
professionals volunteering through your organization to help provide some of
these services. Is that right?
Erica (09:01):
Yes. Yeah. So we're putting yep, we're able to put
medical staff and provide some of these services. And for
this particular project, it is it is medical staff. But
we do work with actually a number of volunteers in
the U.S. internationally as well to support particularly our disaster
response efforts. And a lot of those doctors who work
with a lot of organizations that are based in California.
(09:23):
Stanford University is a big partner of ours, UCLA, USC.
We have doctors from all across the California medical system
that that help support our work and that power volunteer
efforts here in the U.S. and around the world.
Bryan (09:36):
Let's dig into all those gaps that you mentioned that
COVID exposed them. And we've tried to cover some of
these issues on the show. Certainly, we've covered the long
term care facilities, issues we've had to California, long term care.
I can't get the acronym right, but California Long Term
Care Association, which basically the doctors that work in the
long term care facilities, but you're talking about a broader
(09:57):
set of issues. I think that COVID exposed once once
we got through it, through the sort of rampant spread
of COVID in long term care facilities. So, yeah, could
you expand a little bit on what what other gaps
you think we we really need to focus on now?
Erica (10:12):
Sure. So, you know, certainly health care workers, I mean,
I think it became clear that COVID exposed just, you know,
the the health care worker shortage in the U.S., all
of U.S. really. And how how much certainly we rely
on them. But how little sort of resiliency and the
bench strength there may be in our health care workforce.
(10:34):
It's a part of what we did. You know, all
of these individuals who were working during COVID 19 were
also facing their own emergencies at home. They had their
own families to try and take care of. And and
that's true in any emergency. And I think at times
we forget about that. The responders are also in the
middle of the crisis themselves. And so providing this surge capacity,
(10:56):
you know, we had the ability to have doctors and
nurses come from other parts of the country. And really,
whether it was California hot spot or New York was
the hot spot. Help relieve some of these workers day
to day so that they could come home and recover
and take care of themselves and their own families. And
so that was a really critical part of it. I
think another gap that that we found was where health
(11:20):
care happens. Right. Health care doesn't just happen in hospitals.
Long term care facilities, health care is happening in people's homes.
People can't get to hospitals and health clinics all the
time and they want to go where they're familiar. You know,
one of the things I think that that we saw
again across the country that didn't work as well as
we thought it might was that have these large facilities
(11:41):
where people could come and have COVID treatment or get,
you know, get the treatment that they needed. People didn't
want to go there. They want to go to their
local doctor. They want to go to their local clinic.
And so, again, making sure we were providing the training
for those frontline health workers and an increase in that capacity.
So we set up medical tents and shelters so that
(12:02):
hospitals had extra vent space, they had triage space. They
could increase their own capacity because people were showing up
and they could treat them there. They didn't have to
send them somewhere else for the care that they needed.
Bryan (12:13):
One of the guests and it actually may have been
one of the Doctors Urgent Care Association, really raised it
for us in the show. And I hadn't thought about
this before, but it just sort of this huge discrepancy
between health care access in the Central Valley versus what
goes on in L.A. and San Francisco. And there are
bigger cities and clearly have issues in the cities, too.
(12:34):
But but, you know, I learned some really alarming things
about maybe like one doctor in the Central Valley, you know,
being assigned to like, you know, ten or 12 long
term care facilities because, you know, just real sort of
deserts of health care access. Not no, no pun intended
in the Central Valley. It's. Something that you see as
(12:54):
an acute problem and you know. Any thoughts on what
we can do to solve this? It's sort of hard
for me to get my head around the solutions because like,
you can't force doctors to move to Fresno if they
don't want to live in Fresno. So how do you
how do you see this issue playing out.
Erica (13:09):
Right in California? It's an issue nationwide. And I know
I know there's a lot of a lot of people,
a lot of really smart people trying to to to
address this. But one of the challenges is, is that
as hospitals and health care systems have consolidated and hospitals
may be shut down, particularly in more rural areas, health
(13:30):
care is moving further and further away from the people
who need it. And it's becoming more and more of
a challenge for how to get it. And so what
that's meant for for us and when we're looking at
health care programming and how we can fill gaps is
we're really trying to work with communities to figure out
how to bring health care back to people. And so
we are looking at things like how can we help
(13:53):
and support efforts to increase public health messaging and the
work of public health care. We're taking some of the
lessons that we know have worked so well internationally. How
do we use better use community health workers in the
US and get people out into communities to be able
to help people get access to care, to be able
to report back on what some of the needs are?
(14:16):
It's something that that we use. Community health workers and
health volunteers in almost every country where we work. And
it's something that that we're really interested in seeing if
we can increase here in the U.S.. And so that's
part of what we're doing as well. And then it's
also helping some of these community clinics that that are
at the frontlines of health care, also reach out to
(14:37):
their own patients. So sometimes that means having mobile units
or transportation vehicles that can bring doctors to patients and
patients to to clinics or can help get prescriptions. Many
people increasingly are living in pharmacy deserves where there's no
available pharmacy to fill their prescription, and they have to
go further and further away to get access to it.
(14:57):
So it's really kind of working with communities to figure
out what the best solutions are and how we can
create those linkages. And that's where we see, you know,
we can kind of help fill some of the gaps.
Bryan (15:09):
What's the role for telehealth here? I know it's not
a panacea for these problems, but can it at least
help with sort of entry point into into the system
and certainly have broadband issues as well in some of
these places? But how do you how do you see
how do you see telehealth fitting into this puzzle?
Erica (15:28):
Absolutely. And I think one of the things that, you know,
when we think about COVID, one of the things that
we found is that actually telehealth can can have a
big role to play. And of course, to your point,
you have to make sure you have broadband and access.
And those are those are their own issues. But we
have found to be particularly helpful in the in a
disaster response space as well. And we did some work
(15:50):
around providing mental health care, for example, in Kentucky after
the tornadoes there a few years ago, where we were
able to help augment mental health services through telehealth networks,
because they certainly have the impact of the tornadoes there.
But there they also have a real crisis of mental
health care professionals. You know, locally, they don't have enough.
(16:12):
And so telehealth was really able to to help come
in and provide care for folks. So it's definitely an
option in getting people access to the care they need.
Bryan (16:21):
I mean, mental health seems like the best use case
for this. And I'm not suggesting it's the same as
physically being with a mental health care provider. I'm sure
there's value in that. But I would imagine for a
lot of people, just the ease of access and the
comfort of being in their own home and, you know,
not losing a lot. And, you know, if the result
is that you just do it more and you engage
(16:44):
with there be more because it's it's easy to do that,
that that seems like a better outcome overall. Is that
or am I missing something here? When we think about,
you know, the mental health aspects or.
Erica (16:55):
Yeah, I think it's a tool in the toolbox, right?
I think to build more resilient communities, you have to
have lots of different tools and people have to have people.
The health care system has to have a number of
different levers they can pull on. So if it's telehealth
for mental health care, if it's, you know, transportation vehicles
so that people can get to pharmacies, you know, it's
having this package so that whatever crisis an individual our
(17:18):
community may be facing, they have options. That's what's going
to create a more resilient and adaptable and flexible health
care system. We're not going to certainly stop any of
these crises from happening. You know, whether it's disasters or
disease outbreaks are going to occur. So having this kind
of toolbox with lots of options are going to help
everybody be more resilient. And that's really what you want,
that the crisis is going to happen. How quickly can
(17:40):
people recover?
Bryan (17:41):
You know, the pharmacy things interesting. I don't think we
really talked about that before. I mean, that seems like
such a solvable problem in the age of, you know,
Amazon being able to deliver any. Into your house in
a few hours. So, you know, is that the. What
is the status of all the online pharmacies and how
are we tackling that in. In California here there's there's.
(18:05):
You know I would I would assume COVID at least
helped us build out the delivery infrastructure for for that
sort of thing. So I guess you said a tool
in the toolbox. That's that sounds about right. But what
what are we doing on that topic that feels like
an imminently solvable problem?
Erica (18:19):
Yeah, I'm not as familiar specifically with the the work
around pharmacy in California, but I think again, to your point.
Having tools in the toolbox, having people being able to
access their pharmaceuticals, their medications, making sure they can get
them either delivered through that, through the mail, that they
have transportation to get to a pharmacist and to be
(18:41):
able to ask, ask for care. Again, it's just this
how do we make sure if pharmacies are closing in
certain areas that we're also? What does that mean then,
for people to access medication? Because if they don't take
their medication, right, we're going to just continue the cycle
of of poor health outcomes. So there's lots of different
ways to do that. There's great organizations that are looking
(19:02):
to connect people to pharmacies and to pharmacies. And I
think we just have to continue to innovate around that,
really kind of think outside the box and think about
new ways to whether it's pharmaceutical, mental health, primary health care.
How are we going to continue to connect people in
a world that's just continuing to change?
Bryan (19:20):
Yeah, I love online pharmacies because the last place I
want to be when I'm sick is in pharmaceutical companies.
Like people personally. Yes. Extended in the mail just makes total,
total sense to me. And I'm surprised we're not doing
it more. Really. It just it just feels like such
a natural, natural efficiency to to get out of the system. Okay.
(19:43):
So that's that's a great overview in California. And you're
doing some amazing work. I hope other policymakers out there
listening when Aboriginality goes to tackle, talk about how to
tackle some of these these issues. And in a you know,
in the tech capital of the world, these things feel
like things we should really be leading on. But the let's,
let's broaden the scope to talk about internationally. Obviously some
(20:05):
devastating earthquakes recently happened in Syria and Turkey. So can
you give an overview of what you're doing there?
Erica (20:12):
Sure. Yeah, absolutely. And it's the heartbreaking, you know, to
as of today, you know, you know, the reports are
now that more than 40,000 people have died in Turkey,
in Syria. And I know relief and recovery efforts are continuing.
And International Medical Corps has been present in Syria since 2008.
(20:34):
And so our teams were on the ground. We've deployed medical,
mobile medical units and, you know, a lot of hospitals
and health facilities, probably the infrastructure was obviously already decimated
inside Syria. And so the needs there are pretty dire.
We have a number of of new we have hundreds
of local staff on the ground who've mobilized to to
(20:56):
respond to this. And we've also delivered about 15 tons
worth of supplies. You know, it's absolutely frigid. Temperatures are
cold overnight. People are displaced. And the threat of, you know,
disease outbreaks in a situation like that are incredibly high.
And so so we do have teams on on the
(21:16):
ground in Syria. We're also talking with the World Health
Organization to see if we can deploy one of our
emergency medical team teams that that they sponsor the World
Health Organization and has a classification system to to call
up emergency medical teams at a greater rate when there's
(21:40):
a disaster. And so we're also looking at that as well,
which may mean that we would expand the emergency care
that we're providing there. But it's been a place where
we've been for for a number of years, providing health care,
providing health related services, and and we're certainly going to
stay in Turkey. We've had had past experience there. We
have a number of partners that we're supporting. We're doing
quite a bit of distribution of supplies as well as
(22:01):
we look through what are the specific health care needs
and how how can we support those? But our teams
are we're in motion as soon as the earthquakes have
happened on the ground and have been doing just really
incredible work one on one with individuals making sure that
they are getting the care that they need when there's
just so the need is so great.
Bryan (22:21):
Yeah, it's amazing. I think one of the things I
always think about whenever there's a disaster is I sort
of struggle with getting my head around what our government
is doing or should be doing versus what the role
for nonprofits and the private sector are. How do you
how do you think about that topic in a situation
like this? I mean, I know the U.S. government is
clearly helping, but but where do you really see the
(22:42):
the gaps that you all try to fill in situations
like this?
Erica (22:45):
We're very close partner with the US government as well
as other governments and multi lateral bilateral. Organizations like the U.N. globally.
And so we work really hand in hand in this
case with the U.S. government to deliver care. They provide
a lot of the funding, resources and mobilization. They're also
providing teams and guidance on the ground. And so we
(23:05):
work really closely with them. You know, I think for
a role or an organization like ours where our role
really comes in, it is the ability to to respond
and to be the eyes and ears and to be
flexible and to really figure out what is needed and
where it's needed. And being able to work really closely
with government or other donors and local ministries of health
to help them identify where the needs are. So if
(23:27):
government can provide the resources that they can provide and
that's that's financial resources and also supplies. That's incredibly important.
And then we can be the kind of flexible team
on the ground that's getting, again, meeting people where they are,
getting into those smaller communities, figuring out where the needs
are greatest and making sure that we're bringing health care
(23:47):
to people because they don't have the means to move
right now, to travel, to get out and to get
where they need to be.
Bryan (23:53):
Great explanation. The last thing I want to ask you
about is the war in Ukraine, which we we haven't
had too many good entry points to talk about on
the show here. So, so glad you can discuss this
issue near and dear to to a lot of our hearts.
What are you working on in there specifically right now
in Ukraine?
Erica (24:12):
Yeah, we have a really robust response in Ukraine, and
I have colleagues doing just truly incredible work. And this
is a place where we've also leveraged a number of
our U.S. based partners and our volunteers who have who
have gone out and helped us support this effort. So
we are on the front lines of the health care
(24:34):
response providing medical care. We've reached some of that. And
I should say we were on the ground in Ukraine.
We've been there since 2014. And so we were there
when this crisis broke out. We've reached about close to
6 million people with services so far, with health care services,
we are providing direct patient care when we can. And
(24:56):
we are distributing again, these kind of what we call
non-food items, blankets, other supplies that help keep people healthy,
clean water, mental health care, cash assistance in a place
like Ukraine. You know, people can't access any of their resources.
They've lost everything. Even if they have funding or resources
in banks, it doesn't mean they can get to it.
(25:16):
And so we're really making sure that people have those
kinds of resources to be able to get the supplies
that they need. And so we've got teams on the
ground where across kind of ten regions in Ukraine, and
we continue to move as access opens up. And the
other thing that we've done in Ukraine, which we're really
proud of, is developing a trauma care response training program.
(25:40):
And so we've worked very closely with some of our partners,
particularly with Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, to develop a training program
around what's called Stop the Bleed, and then chemical, biological,
radiological and nuclear cyber burn training, incident response training to
train local doctors on how to respond to these kinds
(26:00):
of crises, because this may be something they don't have
training in or ever had to deal with before. And
now they are really looking at the threat of of
chemical or nuclear or other kinds of crises. And so
we've trained thousands of people to date, thousands of doctors,
instantly health workers on on that as well. And we've
used a lot of our volunteer doctors to provide that
(26:21):
training to to go to Ukraine and provide that training
and as well as to help us develop it. And
and I think that's a really it's really indicative of
how International Medical Corps works. Right. How can we sort
of address the crisis right now and then how can
we build capacity so that the health care system can
continue to respond as the crisis may continue or as
they move into recovery? But it's it's absolutely heartbreaking. And
(26:45):
I just, you know, the things that our colleagues are
seeing there and in Syria every day, I just have
the greatest respect for the work that they do on
the ground.
Bryan (26:54):
Yeah. So it strikes me as one of the big
differences between the two places is Ukraine is an active
war zone. So, you know, your volunteers are putting themselves
in jeopardy when they go there. So so how how
do you convince them to do that? How do you
have those conversations? How how do you even think about
keeping them safe in an active warzone?
Erica (27:13):
We work with some of the best volunteers, I would say,
in the world. They they are interested to go. They
you know, we work with a lot of emergency room
doctors who are eager to respond with us, and we're
incredibly grateful for that. We do have a very robust
security team here, an international medical corps who helps provide
(27:34):
that kind of training, who's constantly monitoring what's happening on
the ground, who's making sure we're not sending people into
places where we can't ensure their security and we don't
have have, you know, making sure we have the plans
to move people as we need to. And so, you know,
a lot of what International Medical Corps does. Is is right.
Getting people in things to learn are needed most and
(27:55):
and keeping them out of harm's way while we're doing it.
And so we have a just a phenomenal logistics and
supply chain and security team that is the backbone of
the work that we do.
Bryan (28:04):
So many of Ukraine's citizens are actually not in Ukraine anymore.
I don't know what their current numbers are, but this
huge outflow of refugees leaving. Do you do you work
in other countries, too, with these Ukrainian refugees? Are you
pretty much focused on, you know, on the ground in Ukraine?
Erica (28:22):
Our largest response is on the on the ground in Ukraine.
We've done some work in some of the neighboring countries.
And so we're certainly seeing some of those response efforts
as well. And again, helping like we would any anywhere
else in the world. You see things like ministries of
health and health systems being strained, education, something strange. And,
you know, as more and more people come into a
(28:43):
country and who are displaced. But our work is primarily
focused in Ukraine right now in response to this crisis.
Bryan (28:50):
I think one of the things that's been heartening to
me is to see the EU countries and NATO's countries,
I guess, in particular taking in refugees throughout these different
regions and some some amazing programs that that I've learned
about of children and families, you know, being being, you know,
housed and grouped with families in other countries and, you know,
(29:14):
these other NATO countries providing financial support to help make
that happen. And it's been I think it's something that
this whole topic I feel like unfortunately the US is
most people in the US are just forgetting about because
it's sort of been in the news for so long
and it's just it's just kind of sliding to the
backburner in a lot of ways. What what do you
think Americans can be can be doing here? Getting involved
(29:38):
with your organization is obvious. Obviously, one way to do
it and I'd love you to talk more about how
people can help in that. But yeah, like if you're
if you're just an ordinary American listening to this and
hearing about any of these crises and you want to help,
what's the best way to get involved?
Erica (29:53):
To get involved with with International Medical Corps, you can
go to our website, which is International Medical Corps dot org.
And there's opportunities to to donate to support our responders,
to donate to to support our responses on the ground.
And that's certainly a way that that can be incredibly helpful.
You know, we we often get people who want to
(30:14):
fund stuff and stuff can be helpful. But really, those
donations that provide the most flexibility for our responders to
be able to make the recommendations and get the supplies
they need to provide the care that's needed is always
most helpful. I would also say, you know, getting involved
in refugee issues is also incredibly important in the US.
And so much of the work when people are interested
(30:37):
in learning about issues that face refugees in the U.S.,
so much of that happens at the community level and
there's great organizations doing that work. And for people who
may have arrived here from Ukraine or other places, and
if you want to get involved and local organizations that,
you know, help people find housing, help people get into
the school system are incredibly effective. And so I would
(30:58):
encourage people to also meet locally when they're thinking about
refugee issues or how they may want to help people
who are displaced. And because there's lots of organizations doing
great work here. And, you know, for us, when we
when we think about sort of refugee situations or people
who may need help, who have been displaced and nobody
takes that journey lightly, it's not it's not an easy
(31:21):
path to to follow. And for us, we're we're committed
to being there when people show up. And I can
there's so many people in the US, too, who who
also do that in their local communities and that that
can be incredibly, incredibly important and effective.
Bryan (31:33):
So if you're a health care worker, if you know
a health care worker and they want to get involved,
same website as a places to volunteer their.
Erica (31:41):
Yep, same website that you can go and you can
also go to to International Medical Corps and go to
that career section and you can search, volunteer and you're
able to apply to to be a volunteer medical professional
with the organization. And we have a great team of
people that will walk you through the process to go
(32:02):
to learn about what we do, how we deploy and
how often we deploy, answer all the questions around that.
And we always meet people and we always need people
in our medical roster.
Bryan (32:13):
Right. Well, Erica, thanks so much for being here. Thanks
for all the great work you're doing. Great. Great to
highlight some of these issues and we really appreciate you
being on the show. Is there anything I didn't ask
you that that I should have? I sometimes like to
ask like I I'm surprised at the answers. But but anyway,
to encourage you to join our listeners to hear about.
Erica (32:33):
I think just, you know, we're really energized and excited
about the work that we're doing here in the U.S.
And I think, you know, there's a lot of challenges
I think, that COVID has exposed. But I think we're
also just incredibly fortunate or incredibly fortunate to work with
great partners here in California and at the county and
(32:53):
state level to really think about new ways to do that.
So we just look forward to continuing to be part
of the conversation.
Bryan (32:59):
Erica, thanks again. We'll put the website in the show notes,
but thanks. Thanks again for being on today.
Erica (33:05):
Thank you for having me.
Bryan (33:07):
We invite you to share ideas or guests to ask
questions and comments. You can find us at Neptune Ops dot com.
Follow us and subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts
as we continue to explore the inside stories Driving California politics.
This is the nation's State of Play podcast. I'm your host,
Bryan Miller, and thank you for listening. OLAS media.
The views and opinions expressed in this program are those
of the Speaker's and do not necessarily reflect the views
or positions of any entities they represent, including allies. OLAS Media.
Bryan (00:12):
OLAS Media Presents Nation State of play. Welcome to the
(00:38):
Nation State of Play podcast. I'm your host, Bryan Miller.
And each episode we explore the political stories that are
driving public policy in California. We explore these stories with
political insiders, business leaders, journalists and policymakers themselves to get
below the surface of the headlines and show you the
true forces shaping our nation's state. Thanks for listening. We
have a great guest Erica Tavares with International Medical Corps.
(01:01):
Discussion covers some issues close to home and the refugee perspective,
but also some international issues that are very high profile
in the news right now. So it's an amazing organization.
They do incredible work both here and abroad, and glad
to have this chance to bring some of those issues
to your attention. Hope you'll find a way to learn
more about the organization and we'll put all the links
to them in the show notes. So. Erika Tavarez with
(01:24):
the International Medical Corps coming up right after this.
Erica (01:28):
Listen to our weekly podcast. How to Win Friends and
Save the Republic. To hear the latest updates from the
Democracy reform space, subscribe and learn more about us at
nonpartisan reformers. Dot org.
UU (01:47):
Welcome back to the
Bryan (01:48):
Nation's State of Play podcast. Erica, thanks so much for
being on the show today. It is a pleasure to
have you.
Erica (01:54):
Thank you so much for having me here.
Bryan (01:55):
Can you maybe start by just giving a little bit
of an overview of your organization, who you are and
what you focus on at a at a global scale?
Erica (02:03):
Sure. International Medical Corps is a disaster response and health
care organization. We have been responding to disasters and crises
around the world for the last almost 40 years. We
define disasters pretty broadly. It includes natural disasters, but also
disease outbreaks like COVID 19 also includes conflict, conflict and wars.
(02:26):
And so we do also respond when there is a
crisis providing emergency response, bringing people health care and health
related services. And then we're committed to staying. We invest
in health care systems. We partner with the countries where
we work, we partner with communities and the health systems
on the ground to help them recover and build back
better so that the health care system we're leaving behind
(02:48):
can continue to provide services to the communities that need
it most.
Bryan (02:53):
What's great. And based here in California.
Erica (02:56):
We are based here in California. We were founded in
1984 by an emergency room doctor, Dr. Bob Simon, who
worked at UCLA. He went to Pakistan to work with
refugees who had fled Afghanistan and very quickly realized you
could never bring in enough doctors to provide the care
that was needed. And so really started launching training programs.
(03:18):
And it was really from from there that the organization grew.
We were very early on looking to go into places
where we could provide training so that local doctors could
be able to take care of their own communities.
Bryan (03:30):
So I want to talk about a few issues. One
costs and then and then global stuff. But let's talk
about California first. So I know you're working in Los
Angeles and in particular. So could you give us a
little bit of overview of what you're doing here in
California right now?
Erica (03:44):
Sure. So for a long part of our history, International
Medical Corps was focused almost exclusively internationally. Since 2005, we've
done some work in the U.S. responding to disasters. But
it was really after the COVID 19 outbreak where we
grew our U.S. response fairly significantly, including in California, that
(04:06):
we realized that really there are some of the challenges
that that individuals and communities face. Accessing health care in
the U.S. is just as challenging or just as difficult
as anywhere where we work in the world. I think
it's it's no secret that COVID 19 outbreak, I think,
exposed a lot of the gaps in our own health
care system here at home, which some of the limitations.
(04:27):
And and in California, we worked with our 15 hospitals,
51 long term health care facilities for elderly patients, really
providing training, medical surge, staffing and extra space. We set
up mobile hospitals and mobile units so that we could
expand the capacity of the health care system to provide
(04:47):
care when it was needed most. Since that time, we've
continued to work very closely, particularly with Los Angeles County,
but also with the state, to really figure out what
other gaps we might be able to fill. We've provided
some training to health facilities that are in the Central
Valley around wildfire preparedness. And now I'm here in Los
(05:08):
Angeles this week and really working with our partners to
launch a program to help provide additional health care to
people living in transitional shelters, knowing that making sure that
people who are experiencing homelessness have access to health care.
We're trying to innovate and partner to figure out how
we can maybe keep some people out of the emergency rooms,
(05:28):
provide them care where where they are, and reconnect them
to their doctors. So, again, really partnering with the health
care system to try and make it stronger and work better.
Bryan (05:37):
But yeah, it's that's we love talking about local issues
when when we can on this focus when we're talking
about L.A. County by county is bigger than 37 states
in this country. So I think anything that happens at
a county level level there is just enormously important in
terms of the number of people it impacts. So so yeah,
let's let's dig into that a little bit more. It
sounds like you're working actually with the county directly on
(06:00):
these issues right now.
Erica (06:02):
We're coordinating with the county directly. We partner directly, though,
with other nonprofit organizations. So organizations that are running shelters.
And we've worked with the Los Angeles County Department of Health.
We've worked with our Housing Services Authority to keep them
up to date on what we're doing. In this case,
we've actually mobilized private resources, resources from foundations, private sector donors,
(06:26):
individuals to pilot this initiative and to really kind of
get in there, work very closely with our nonprofit partner
to test this model to see if we can provide
health care to where people are and really work with
them on a very 1 to 1 basis to reconnect
them to their doctor. If we can get people who
are experiencing homelessness back into kind of the health care
(06:47):
system and again, keeping them out of the emergency rooms
or further taxing the kind of emergency response portion of
health care here. The state has.
Bryan (06:56):
Invested a lot in recent years in homelessness. Is this
is this particular I haven't heard that this particular aspect
of the issue before. So I'm really glad you're talking
about this of health care for homeless. We talk a
lot about housing on this show and a lot of
state initiatives on that. Has there been any state initiatives
on this particular aspect of it that you're focused on?
Erica (07:17):
I'm not as familiar with what's happening at the state level,
but we're really looking at what's happening right now at
the local level and at the county level. And we've
talked with a lot of the providers who are working
in this space. And really an international medical corps approach
is really to kind of come in and see where
we can fill gaps. And so we you know, we
know we don't have all the solutions to this. It's
(07:39):
a large problem. There's lots of different facets to it.
But but we heard from partners on the ground, from
nonprofit organizations, that there there was a gap in providing
health care in shelters and that. People were asking for it.
And this is where we really try to take an
approach to say, okay, people are here in shelters. They
(08:00):
are asking for health care, they're expressing health care needs.
There is distrust of the health care system among some
of these populations. And so the approach here is to
take a very individualized approach to kind of have clinical doctors,
nurses who can work one on one with clients, with
caseworkers at the shelters to really kind of shepherd individuals
(08:23):
through our health care system is incredibly complex. It's even
more complex if you don't have the resources to be
able to navigate it. And so really helping people kind
of navigate in this one on one and reconnect them
is what we're trying to achieve here. And it is
what we heard from partners on the ground. That was
a real gap. There are, you know, teams providing medicine,
(08:43):
you know, street medicine teams or certainly emergency rooms that
are providing a lot of care. But how could we
again go where people are and where they're asking for
services and meet them at that place?
Bryan (08:53):
And then you actually have doctors and other health care
professionals volunteering through your organization to help provide some of
these services. Is that right?
Erica (09:01):
Yes. Yeah. So we're putting yep, we're able to put
medical staff and provide some of these services. And for
this particular project, it is it is medical staff. But
we do work with actually a number of volunteers in
the U.S. internationally as well to support particularly our disaster
response efforts. And a lot of those doctors who work
with a lot of organizations that are based in California.
(09:23):
Stanford University is a big partner of ours, UCLA, USC.
We have doctors from all across the California medical system
that that help support our work and that power volunteer
efforts here in the U.S. and around the world.
Bryan (09:36):
Let's dig into all those gaps that you mentioned that
COVID exposed them. And we've tried to cover some of
these issues on the show. Certainly, we've covered the long
term care facilities, issues we've had to California, long term care.
I can't get the acronym right, but California Long Term
Care Association, which basically the doctors that work in the
long term care facilities, but you're talking about a broader
(09:57):
set of issues. I think that COVID exposed once once
we got through it, through the sort of rampant spread
of COVID in long term care facilities. So, yeah, could
you expand a little bit on what what other gaps
you think we we really need to focus on now?
Erica (10:12):
Sure. So, you know, certainly health care workers, I mean,
I think it became clear that COVID exposed just, you know,
the the health care worker shortage in the U.S., all
of U.S. really. And how how much certainly we rely
on them. But how little sort of resiliency and the
bench strength there may be in our health care workforce.
(10:34):
It's a part of what we did. You know, all
of these individuals who were working during COVID 19 were
also facing their own emergencies at home. They had their
own families to try and take care of. And and
that's true in any emergency. And I think at times
we forget about that. The responders are also in the
middle of the crisis themselves. And so providing this surge capacity,
(10:56):
you know, we had the ability to have doctors and
nurses come from other parts of the country. And really,
whether it was California hot spot or New York was
the hot spot. Help relieve some of these workers day
to day so that they could come home and recover
and take care of themselves and their own families. And
so that was a really critical part of it. I
think another gap that that we found was where health
(11:20):
care happens. Right. Health care doesn't just happen in hospitals.
Long term care facilities, health care is happening in people's homes.
People can't get to hospitals and health clinics all the
time and they want to go where they're familiar. You know,
one of the things I think that that we saw
again across the country that didn't work as well as
we thought it might was that have these large facilities
(11:41):
where people could come and have COVID treatment or get,
you know, get the treatment that they needed. People didn't
want to go there. They want to go to their
local doctor. They want to go to their local clinic.
And so, again, making sure we were providing the training
for those frontline health workers and an increase in that capacity.
So we set up medical tents and shelters so that
(12:02):
hospitals had extra vent space, they had triage space. They
could increase their own capacity because people were showing up
and they could treat them there. They didn't have to
send them somewhere else for the care that they needed.
Bryan (12:13):
One of the guests and it actually may have been
one of the Doctors Urgent Care Association, really raised it
for us in the show. And I hadn't thought about
this before, but it just sort of this huge discrepancy
between health care access in the Central Valley versus what
goes on in L.A. and San Francisco. And there are
bigger cities and clearly have issues in the cities, too.
(12:34):
But but, you know, I learned some really alarming things
about maybe like one doctor in the Central Valley, you know,
being assigned to like, you know, ten or 12 long
term care facilities because, you know, just real sort of
deserts of health care access. Not no, no pun intended
in the Central Valley. It's. Something that you see as
(12:54):
an acute problem and you know. Any thoughts on what
we can do to solve this? It's sort of hard
for me to get my head around the solutions because like,
you can't force doctors to move to Fresno if they
don't want to live in Fresno. So how do you
how do you see this issue playing out.
Erica (13:09):
Right in California? It's an issue nationwide. And I know
I know there's a lot of a lot of people,
a lot of really smart people trying to to to
address this. But one of the challenges is, is that
as hospitals and health care systems have consolidated and hospitals
may be shut down, particularly in more rural areas, health
(13:30):
care is moving further and further away from the people
who need it. And it's becoming more and more of
a challenge for how to get it. And so what
that's meant for for us and when we're looking at
health care programming and how we can fill gaps is
we're really trying to work with communities to figure out
how to bring health care back to people. And so
we are looking at things like how can we help
(13:53):
and support efforts to increase public health messaging and the
work of public health care. We're taking some of the
lessons that we know have worked so well internationally. How
do we use better use community health workers in the
US and get people out into communities to be able
to help people get access to care, to be able
to report back on what some of the needs are?
(14:16):
It's something that that we use. Community health workers and
health volunteers in almost every country where we work. And
it's something that that we're really interested in seeing if
we can increase here in the U.S.. And so that's
part of what we're doing as well. And then it's
also helping some of these community clinics that that are
at the frontlines of health care, also reach out to
(14:37):
their own patients. So sometimes that means having mobile units
or transportation vehicles that can bring doctors to patients and
patients to to clinics or can help get prescriptions. Many
people increasingly are living in pharmacy deserves where there's no
available pharmacy to fill their prescription, and they have to
go further and further away to get access to it.
(14:57):
So it's really kind of working with communities to figure
out what the best solutions are and how we can
create those linkages. And that's where we see, you know,
we can kind of help fill some of the gaps.
Bryan (15:09):
What's the role for telehealth here? I know it's not
a panacea for these problems, but can it at least
help with sort of entry point into into the system
and certainly have broadband issues as well in some of
these places? But how do you how do you see
how do you see telehealth fitting into this puzzle?
Erica (15:28):
Absolutely. And I think one of the things that, you know,
when we think about COVID, one of the things that
we found is that actually telehealth can can have a
big role to play. And of course, to your point,
you have to make sure you have broadband and access.
And those are those are their own issues. But we
have found to be particularly helpful in the in a
disaster response space as well. And we did some work
(15:50):
around providing mental health care, for example, in Kentucky after
the tornadoes there a few years ago, where we were
able to help augment mental health services through telehealth networks,
because they certainly have the impact of the tornadoes there.
But there they also have a real crisis of mental
health care professionals. You know, locally, they don't have enough.
(16:12):
And so telehealth was really able to to help come
in and provide care for folks. So it's definitely an
option in getting people access to the care they need.
Bryan (16:21):
I mean, mental health seems like the best use case
for this. And I'm not suggesting it's the same as
physically being with a mental health care provider. I'm sure
there's value in that. But I would imagine for a
lot of people, just the ease of access and the
comfort of being in their own home and, you know,
not losing a lot. And, you know, if the result
is that you just do it more and you engage
(16:44):
with there be more because it's it's easy to do that,
that that seems like a better outcome overall. Is that
or am I missing something here? When we think about,
you know, the mental health aspects or.
Erica (16:55):
Yeah, I think it's a tool in the toolbox, right?
I think to build more resilient communities, you have to
have lots of different tools and people have to have people.
The health care system has to have a number of
different levers they can pull on. So if it's telehealth
for mental health care, if it's, you know, transportation vehicles
so that people can get to pharmacies, you know, it's
having this package so that whatever crisis an individual our
(17:18):
community may be facing, they have options. That's what's going
to create a more resilient and adaptable and flexible health
care system. We're not going to certainly stop any of
these crises from happening. You know, whether it's disasters or
disease outbreaks are going to occur. So having this kind
of toolbox with lots of options are going to help
everybody be more resilient. And that's really what you want,
that the crisis is going to happen. How quickly can
(17:40):
people recover?
Bryan (17:41):
You know, the pharmacy things interesting. I don't think we
really talked about that before. I mean, that seems like
such a solvable problem in the age of, you know,
Amazon being able to deliver any. Into your house in
a few hours. So, you know, is that the. What
is the status of all the online pharmacies and how
are we tackling that in. In California here there's there's.
(18:05):
You know I would I would assume COVID at least
helped us build out the delivery infrastructure for for that
sort of thing. So I guess you said a tool
in the toolbox. That's that sounds about right. But what
what are we doing on that topic that feels like
an imminently solvable problem?
Erica (18:19):
Yeah, I'm not as familiar specifically with the the work
around pharmacy in California, but I think again, to your point.
Having tools in the toolbox, having people being able to
access their pharmaceuticals, their medications, making sure they can get
them either delivered through that, through the mail, that they
have transportation to get to a pharmacist and to be
(18:41):
able to ask, ask for care. Again, it's just this
how do we make sure if pharmacies are closing in
certain areas that we're also? What does that mean then,
for people to access medication? Because if they don't take
their medication, right, we're going to just continue the cycle
of of poor health outcomes. So there's lots of different
ways to do that. There's great organizations that are looking
(19:02):
to connect people to pharmacies and to pharmacies. And I
think we just have to continue to innovate around that,
really kind of think outside the box and think about
new ways to whether it's pharmaceutical, mental health, primary health care.
How are we going to continue to connect people in
a world that's just continuing to change?
Bryan (19:20):
Yeah, I love online pharmacies because the last place I
want to be when I'm sick is in pharmaceutical companies.
Like people personally. Yes. Extended in the mail just makes total,
total sense to me. And I'm surprised we're not doing
it more. Really. It just it just feels like such
a natural, natural efficiency to to get out of the system. Okay.
(19:43):
So that's that's a great overview in California. And you're
doing some amazing work. I hope other policymakers out there
listening when Aboriginality goes to tackle, talk about how to
tackle some of these these issues. And in a you know,
in the tech capital of the world, these things feel
like things we should really be leading on. But the let's,
let's broaden the scope to talk about internationally. Obviously some
(20:05):
devastating earthquakes recently happened in Syria and Turkey. So can
you give an overview of what you're doing there?
Erica (20:12):
Sure. Yeah, absolutely. And it's the heartbreaking, you know, to
as of today, you know, you know, the reports are
now that more than 40,000 people have died in Turkey,
in Syria. And I know relief and recovery efforts are continuing.
And International Medical Corps has been present in Syria since 2008.
(20:34):
And so our teams were on the ground. We've deployed medical,
mobile medical units and, you know, a lot of hospitals
and health facilities, probably the infrastructure was obviously already decimated
inside Syria. And so the needs there are pretty dire.
We have a number of of new we have hundreds
of local staff on the ground who've mobilized to to
(20:56):
respond to this. And we've also delivered about 15 tons
worth of supplies. You know, it's absolutely frigid. Temperatures are
cold overnight. People are displaced. And the threat of, you know,
disease outbreaks in a situation like that are incredibly high.
And so so we do have teams on on the
(21:16):
ground in Syria. We're also talking with the World Health
Organization to see if we can deploy one of our
emergency medical team teams that that they sponsor the World
Health Organization and has a classification system to to call
up emergency medical teams at a greater rate when there's
(21:40):
a disaster. And so we're also looking at that as well,
which may mean that we would expand the emergency care
that we're providing there. But it's been a place where
we've been for for a number of years, providing health care,
providing health related services, and and we're certainly going to
stay in Turkey. We've had had past experience there. We
have a number of partners that we're supporting. We're doing
quite a bit of distribution of supplies as well as
(22:01):
we look through what are the specific health care needs
and how how can we support those? But our teams
are we're in motion as soon as the earthquakes have
happened on the ground and have been doing just really
incredible work one on one with individuals making sure that
they are getting the care that they need when there's
just so the need is so great.
Bryan (22:21):
Yeah, it's amazing. I think one of the things I
always think about whenever there's a disaster is I sort
of struggle with getting my head around what our government
is doing or should be doing versus what the role
for nonprofits and the private sector are. How do you
how do you think about that topic in a situation
like this? I mean, I know the U.S. government is
clearly helping, but but where do you really see the
(22:42):
the gaps that you all try to fill in situations
like this?
Erica (22:45):
We're very close partner with the US government as well
as other governments and multi lateral bilateral. Organizations like the U.N. globally.
And so we work really hand in hand in this
case with the U.S. government to deliver care. They provide
a lot of the funding, resources and mobilization. They're also
providing teams and guidance on the ground. And so we
(23:05):
work really closely with them. You know, I think for
a role or an organization like ours where our role
really comes in, it is the ability to to respond
and to be the eyes and ears and to be
flexible and to really figure out what is needed and
where it's needed. And being able to work really closely
with government or other donors and local ministries of health
to help them identify where the needs are. So if
(23:27):
government can provide the resources that they can provide and
that's that's financial resources and also supplies. That's incredibly important.
And then we can be the kind of flexible team
on the ground that's getting, again, meeting people where they are,
getting into those smaller communities, figuring out where the needs
are greatest and making sure that we're bringing health care
(23:47):
to people because they don't have the means to move
right now, to travel, to get out and to get
where they need to be.
Bryan (23:53):
Great explanation. The last thing I want to ask you
about is the war in Ukraine, which we we haven't
had too many good entry points to talk about on
the show here. So, so glad you can discuss this
issue near and dear to to a lot of our hearts.
What are you working on in there specifically right now
in Ukraine?
Erica (24:12):
Yeah, we have a really robust response in Ukraine, and
I have colleagues doing just truly incredible work. And this
is a place where we've also leveraged a number of
our U.S. based partners and our volunteers who have who
have gone out and helped us support this effort. So
we are on the front lines of the health care
(24:34):
response providing medical care. We've reached some of that. And
I should say we were on the ground in Ukraine.
We've been there since 2014. And so we were there
when this crisis broke out. We've reached about close to
6 million people with services so far, with health care services,
we are providing direct patient care when we can. And
(24:56):
we are distributing again, these kind of what we call
non-food items, blankets, other supplies that help keep people healthy,
clean water, mental health care, cash assistance in a place
like Ukraine. You know, people can't access any of their resources.
They've lost everything. Even if they have funding or resources
in banks, it doesn't mean they can get to it.
(25:16):
And so we're really making sure that people have those
kinds of resources to be able to get the supplies
that they need. And so we've got teams on the
ground where across kind of ten regions in Ukraine, and
we continue to move as access opens up. And the
other thing that we've done in Ukraine, which we're really
proud of, is developing a trauma care response training program.
(25:40):
And so we've worked very closely with some of our partners,
particularly with Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, to develop a training program
around what's called Stop the Bleed, and then chemical, biological,
radiological and nuclear cyber burn training, incident response training to
train local doctors on how to respond to these kinds
(26:00):
of crises, because this may be something they don't have
training in or ever had to deal with before. And
now they are really looking at the threat of of
chemical or nuclear or other kinds of crises. And so
we've trained thousands of people to date, thousands of doctors,
instantly health workers on on that as well. And we've
used a lot of our volunteer doctors to provide that
(26:21):
training to to go to Ukraine and provide that training
and as well as to help us develop it. And
and I think that's a really it's really indicative of
how International Medical Corps works. Right. How can we sort
of address the crisis right now and then how can
we build capacity so that the health care system can
continue to respond as the crisis may continue or as
they move into recovery? But it's it's absolutely heartbreaking. And
(26:45):
I just, you know, the things that our colleagues are
seeing there and in Syria every day, I just have
the greatest respect for the work that they do on
the ground.
Bryan (26:54):
Yeah. So it strikes me as one of the big
differences between the two places is Ukraine is an active
war zone. So, you know, your volunteers are putting themselves
in jeopardy when they go there. So so how how
do you convince them to do that? How do you
have those conversations? How how do you even think about
keeping them safe in an active warzone?
Erica (27:13):
We work with some of the best volunteers, I would say,
in the world. They they are interested to go. They
you know, we work with a lot of emergency room
doctors who are eager to respond with us, and we're
incredibly grateful for that. We do have a very robust
security team here, an international medical corps who helps provide
(27:34):
that kind of training, who's constantly monitoring what's happening on
the ground, who's making sure we're not sending people into
places where we can't ensure their security and we don't
have have, you know, making sure we have the plans
to move people as we need to. And so, you know,
a lot of what International Medical Corps does. Is is right.
Getting people in things to learn are needed most and
(27:55):
and keeping them out of harm's way while we're doing it.
And so we have a just a phenomenal logistics and
supply chain and security team that is the backbone of
the work that we do.
Bryan (28:04):
So many of Ukraine's citizens are actually not in Ukraine anymore.
I don't know what their current numbers are, but this
huge outflow of refugees leaving. Do you do you work
in other countries, too, with these Ukrainian refugees? Are you
pretty much focused on, you know, on the ground in Ukraine?
Erica (28:22):
Our largest response is on the on the ground in Ukraine.
We've done some work in some of the neighboring countries.
And so we're certainly seeing some of those response efforts
as well. And again, helping like we would any anywhere
else in the world. You see things like ministries of
health and health systems being strained, education, something strange. And,
you know, as more and more people come into a
(28:43):
country and who are displaced. But our work is primarily
focused in Ukraine right now in response to this crisis.
Bryan (28:50):
I think one of the things that's been heartening to
me is to see the EU countries and NATO's countries,
I guess, in particular taking in refugees throughout these different
regions and some some amazing programs that that I've learned
about of children and families, you know, being being, you know,
housed and grouped with families in other countries and, you know,
(29:14):
these other NATO countries providing financial support to help make
that happen. And it's been I think it's something that
this whole topic I feel like unfortunately the US is
most people in the US are just forgetting about because
it's sort of been in the news for so long
and it's just it's just kind of sliding to the
backburner in a lot of ways. What what do you
think Americans can be can be doing here? Getting involved
(29:38):
with your organization is obvious. Obviously, one way to do
it and I'd love you to talk more about how
people can help in that. But yeah, like if you're
if you're just an ordinary American listening to this and
hearing about any of these crises and you want to help,
what's the best way to get involved?
Erica (29:53):
To get involved with with International Medical Corps, you can
go to our website, which is International Medical Corps dot org.
And there's opportunities to to donate to support our responders,
to donate to to support our responses on the ground.
And that's certainly a way that that can be incredibly helpful.
You know, we we often get people who want to
(30:14):
fund stuff and stuff can be helpful. But really, those
donations that provide the most flexibility for our responders to
be able to make the recommendations and get the supplies
they need to provide the care that's needed is always
most helpful. I would also say, you know, getting involved
in refugee issues is also incredibly important in the US.
And so much of the work when people are interested
(30:37):
in learning about issues that face refugees in the U.S.,
so much of that happens at the community level and
there's great organizations doing that work. And for people who
may have arrived here from Ukraine or other places, and
if you want to get involved and local organizations that,
you know, help people find housing, help people get into
the school system are incredibly effective. And so I would
(30:58):
encourage people to also meet locally when they're thinking about
refugee issues or how they may want to help people
who are displaced. And because there's lots of organizations doing
great work here. And, you know, for us, when we
when we think about sort of refugee situations or people
who may need help, who have been displaced and nobody
takes that journey lightly, it's not it's not an easy
(31:21):
path to to follow. And for us, we're we're committed
to being there when people show up. And I can
there's so many people in the US, too, who who
also do that in their local communities and that that
can be incredibly, incredibly important and effective.
Bryan (31:33):
So if you're a health care worker, if you know
a health care worker and they want to get involved,
same website as a places to volunteer their.
Erica (31:41):
Yep, same website that you can go and you can
also go to to International Medical Corps and go to
that career section and you can search, volunteer and you're
able to apply to to be a volunteer medical professional
with the organization. And we have a great team of
people that will walk you through the process to go
(32:02):
to learn about what we do, how we deploy and
how often we deploy, answer all the questions around that.
And we always meet people and we always need people
in our medical roster.
Bryan (32:13):
Right. Well, Erica, thanks so much for being here. Thanks
for all the great work you're doing. Great. Great to
highlight some of these issues and we really appreciate you
being on the show. Is there anything I didn't ask
you that that I should have? I sometimes like to
ask like I I'm surprised at the answers. But but anyway,
to encourage you to join our listeners to hear about.
Erica (32:33):
I think just, you know, we're really energized and excited
about the work that we're doing here in the U.S.
And I think, you know, there's a lot of challenges
I think, that COVID has exposed. But I think we're
also just incredibly fortunate or incredibly fortunate to work with
great partners here in California and at the county and
(32:53):
state level to really think about new ways to do that.
So we just look forward to continuing to be part
of the conversation.
Bryan (32:59):
Erica, thanks again. We'll put the website in the show notes,
but thanks. Thanks again for being on today.
Erica (33:05):
Thank you for having me.
Bryan (33:07):
We invite you to share ideas or guests to ask
questions and comments. You can find us at Neptune Ops dot com.
Follow us and subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts
as we continue to explore the inside stories Driving California politics.
This is the nation's State of Play podcast. I'm your host,
Bryan Miller, and thank you for listening. OLAS media.
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