Structuring Equity Into Minnesota's COVID-19 Response: Lessons Learned and Future Investments.

BACKGROUND: The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) integrated 3 intentional teams into their novel coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) response to ensure equity was not lost in the speed of response. IMPLEMENTATION: These teams-the Cultural, Faith, and Disability Communities Branch, Tribal COVID-19 Healthcare Team, and Vaccine Equity Branch were able to reach communities through trusted partners, elevate the voices of communities most impacted, respect tribal sovereignty, establish equity leadership, and set equity goals and metrics. LESSONS LEARNED: The top-down nature of incident command, combined with pre-COVID-19 systems and structures that impede equity, led to both barriers and opportunities for centering equity in response efforts. Inclusion of staff and community voice in decisions and guidance leads to better results; each community's unique needs have to be considered. Equity metrics and goals help direct resources to the most disadvantaged. State, local, and tribal public health infrastructure was built quickly and needs ongoing resources to be sustained. FUTURE INVESTMENTS: MDH is leveraging new funding to embed successful response structures into the organization. These structures are intended to build state, local, and tribal capacity and address systemic challenges at MDH. CONCLUSION: While equity can be incorporated into pandemic response and incident command structures, ongoing investment to support public health infrastructure is vital to sustaining equity.

Barriers to malaria prevention among immigrant travelers in the United States who visit friends and relatives in sub-Saharan Africa: A cross-sectional, multi-setting survey of knowledge, attitudes, and practices.

BACKGROUND: Despite achievements in the reduction of malaria globally, imported malaria cases to the United States by returning international travelers continue to increase. Immigrants to the United States from sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) who then travel back to their homelands to visit friends and relatives (VFRs) experience a disproportionate burden of malaria illness. Various studies have explored barriers to malaria prevention among VFRs and non-VFRs-travelers to the same destinations with other purpose for travel-but few employed robust epidemiologic study designs or performed comparative analyses of these two groups. To better quantify the key barriers that VFRs face to implement effective malaria prevention measures, we conducted a comprehensive community-based, cross-sectional, survey to identify differences in malaria prevention knowledge, attitudes, and practices (KAP) among VFRs and others traveling to Africa and describe the differences between VFRs and other types of international travelers. METHODS AND FINDINGS: Three distinct populations of travelers with past or planned travel to malaria-endemic countries of SSA were surveyed: VFRs diagnosed with malaria as reported through a state health department; members of the general VFR population (community); and VFR and non-VFR travelers presenting to a travel health clinic, both before their pretravel consultation and again, after return from travel. A Community Advisory Board of African immigrants and prior qualitative research informed survey development and dissemination. Across the three groups, 489 travelers completed surveys: 351 VFRs and 138 non-VFRs. VFRs who reported taking antimalarials on their last trip rated their concern about malaria higher than those who did not. Having taken five or more trips to SSA was reported more commonly among VFRs diagnosed with malaria than community VFRs (44.0% versus 20.4%; p = 0.008). Among travel health clinic patients surveyed before and after travel, VFR travelers were less successful than non-VFRs in adhering to their planned use of antimalarials (82.2% versus 98.7%; p = 0.001) and employing mosquito bite avoidance techniques (e.g., using bed nets: 56.8% versus 81.8%; p = 0.009). VFRs who visited the travel health clinic were more likely than VFR respondents from the community to report taking an antimalarial (83.0% versus 61.9%; p = 0.009), or to report bite avoidance behaviors (e.g., staying indoors when mosquitoes were out: 80.9% versus 59.5%; p = 0.009). CONCLUSIONS: We observed heterogeneity in malaria prevention behaviors among VFRs and between VFR and non-VFR traveler populations. Although VFRs attending the travel health clinic appear to demonstrate better adherence to malaria prevention measures than VFR counterparts surveyed in the community, specialized pretravel care is not sufficient to ensure chemoprophylaxis use and bite avoidance behaviors among VFRs. Even when seeking specialized pretravel care, VFRs experience greater barriers to the use of malaria prevention than non-VFRs. Addressing access to health care and upstream barrier reduction strategies that make intended prevention more achievable, affordable, easier, and resonant among VFRs may improve malaria prevention intervention effectiveness.

Barriers to malaria prevention in US-based travellers visiting friends and relatives abroad: a qualitative study of West African immigrant travellers†.

BACKGROUND: Over half of malaria cases reported in the USA occur among people travelling to visit friends and relatives (VFRs), predominantly to West Africa. Few studies have queried VFR travellers directly on barriers to seeking pre-travel care. We aim to describe the knowledge, attitudes and practices of VFRs travelling to malaria-endemic countries from the USA. With these findings, we aim to design interventions to encourage preventive behaviours before and during travel. METHODS: Sixteen focus groups were held in two US metropolitan areas with West African immigrant populations: Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN, and New York City, NY. A total of 172 people from 13 African countries participated. Focus group discussions were audio-recorded and transcribed, and modified grounded theory analysis was performed. Participants reviewed themes to verify intent of statements. RESULTS: Participants described the high cost of provider visits and chemoprophylaxis, challenges in advocating for themselves in healthcare settings and concerns about offending or inconveniencing hosts as barriers to malaria prevention. Cultural barriers to accessing pre-travel care included competing priorities when trip planning, such as purchasing gifts for family, travel logistics and safety concerns. When participants sought pre-travel care, most consulted their primary care provider. Participants expressed low confidence in US providers' knowledge and training about malaria and other tropical diseases. CONCLUSION: Barriers to pre-travel care for VFR travellers are multifaceted and extend beyond their perception of disease risk. Only some barriers previously reported in anecdotal and qualitative literature were supported in our findings. Future interventions should be aimed at barriers identified by individual communities and involve primary and travel specialist healthcare providers. Additional work is needed to address systems-level barriers to accessing care and establishing community-based programs to support West African VFR traveller health.

Predicting Risk of Imported Disease with Demographics: Geospatial Analysis of Imported Malaria in Minnesota, 2010-2014.

Although immigrants who visit friends and relatives (VFRs) account for most of the travel-acquired malaria cases in the United States, there is limited evidence on community-level risk factors and best practices for prevention appropriate for various VFR groups. Using 2010-2014 malaria case reports, sociodemographic census data, and health services data, we explored and mapped community-level characteristics to understand who is at risk and where imported malaria infections occur in Minnesota. We examined associations with malaria incidence using Poisson and negative binomial regression. Overall, mean incidence was 0.4 cases per 1,000 sub-Saharan African (SSA)-born in communities reporting malaria, with cases concentrated in two areas of Minneapolis-St. Paul. We found moderate and positive associations between imported malaria and counts of SSA- and Asian-born populations, respectively. Our findings may inform future studies to understand the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of VFR travelers and facilitate and focus intervention strategies to reduce imported malaria in the United States.

Incentives for Bushmeat Consumption and Importation among West African Immigrants, Minnesota, USA.

The knowledge, attitudes, and practices surrounding bushmeat consumption and importation in the United States are not well described. Focus groups of West African persons living in Minnesota, USA, found that perceived risks are low and unlikely to deter consumers. Incentives for importation and consumption were multifactorial in this community.