Gerald Sastra/The Cougar
Honors in Community Health at UH (HICH) hosted a webinar to discuss the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the future of public health, the biggest being hospitals and clinics losing money, making it harder to stay open.
The event featured associate clinical professor at the Honors College and College of Medicine, Daniel Price. The major impact of the pandemic that was discussed at the webinar is that the
health care system will struggle to make money with the fixed resources they have on hand.
“Even though we’re putting huge finances and resources into addressing COVID-19, it’s actually
really hurting the health care system,” Price said.
“Hospitals are going out of business, all sorts of clinics will go out of business; their business model has been upended by the epidemic, even more than say, restaurants,” Price added.
Price is involved with community health workers by setting up opportunities for activities and
training where students can interact and learn from them. It brings an opportunity for HICH to
get involved with community health.
HICH member and biomedical sciences junior Mallika Tripathy appreciated hearing the various ways the coronavirus will impact the health industry.
“As an aspiring physician, I enjoyed the discussion on how this pandemic may benefit or
negatively alter individuals’ trust in the health care system,” Tripathy said.
“This is a rapidly unfolding issue, so I enjoyed learning more about how public health will be affected because of the pandemic,” Tripathy added.
Price is also working on a different approach to finding solutions to health problems compared to
taking a top-down approach, where there is one expert who tells everyone else how to operate.
The coronavirus, Price predicts, will not only change how much we use telemedicine, but will also create more efficient means of providing health care.
Cutting off the top-down nature of health care, he said, could make the health care system more
effective.
Community health workers will help connect people in the community who may struggle with
things like getting internet access by creating more access points for finding resources.
This will go hand in hand with using telemedicine effectively and helping people access health care
professionals that they trust.
For more of The Cougar’s coronavirus coverage, click here.
