By Xenia Shih Bion, Illustration by Ard Su, California Health Care Foundation, May 13, 2021
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the staff of Asian Health Services (AHS) in Oakland noticed something worrisome. The city’s Chinatown district, where the community health center operates a few clinics, had lost its routine hustle and bustle.
“The streets were empty,” said Thu Quach, PhD, chief deputy at AHS. “We were still open, so we saw it — all of our staff members were still going into work. But since COVID-19 began over a year ago, we have basically seen our communities go underground.”
The loss of activity in Chinatown coincided with California’s stay-at-home order, which Governor Gavin Newsom issued on March 19, 2020, but that wasn’t the only reason. When AHS staff members called their patients to find out why they had been missing appointments, patients said they were afraid. “It was really heartbreaking to hear how devastated, scared, and depressed they were,” said Quach. “They went underground both because they were afraid of COVID-19 and because they were afraid of people attacking them.” Asian Americans for Community Involvement (AACI), a Federally Qualified Health Center in San Jose, witnessed the same phenomenon after President Donald Trump referred to the coronavirus as the “Chinese virus,” according to AACI’s president, Sarita Kohli, MBA.
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