Testimony Regarding Oversight – COVID-19 in NYC: Evaluating the Present Challenges

COVID positivity rates are now increasing in New York City. The City’s response, however, appears to be ignore it and hope it goes away. The federal government quietly announced that it will end its spending on COVID vaccines, tests, and treatments this fall, shifting costs to private insurers and leaving the uninsured to fend for themselves. Rather than step in to fill this funding gap and ensure that all New Yorkers have access to COVID vaccines, tests, and treatments, we have heard that the City similarly has shuttered T2 grants and its COVID Community Advisory Board.

The impact of these policy changes is already falling hardest on New York’s most marginalized communities: the disabled, communities of color, people whose primary language is not English, and economically disadvantaged New Yorkers. It is incumbent upon New York City to do the hard work to make sure not only that the pandemic ends, but that it ends for all of us, especially the most vulnerable.