The White House is shipping coronavirus rapid tests to historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs). Officials said it is in effort to prevent covid-19 from spreading in high risk communities, McClatchy DC reported.
“We know they’ve been underserved historically, and we just want to support them,” White House coronavirus task force testing czar Adm. Brett Giroir told McClatchy.
The first shipment includes 250,000 rapid tests to 41 public HBCUs the report states. Another 300,000 are due to be delivered next month to 65 additional HBCUs.
“We think it’s very, very important to equip HBCUs,” Giroir said. “It is a fact, except for a few very high-tech globally competitive universities that many of these are small, rural and do not have the kind of laboratory capacity that other universities do have.”
Black Americans have been disproportionately affected by the coronavirus, with the community experiencing more deaths than other groups. Recent data shows of the fatal victims under age 21 who dies, they are predominately Black, Latino and Native American.
Giroir also said they would continue to send the rapid tests “as often as they need.” However, he believes the first shipment should be adequate for a while.
This first shipment should last them quite a period of time unless there’s a very unusual circumstance within that campus,” Giroir told McClatchy.
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Among the HBCUs that have already been shipped tests are Howard University, Florida A&M University, Winston-Salem State University and others.
Officials also said they will eventually supply all 107 schools identified as HBCUs with rapid tests to help combat the coronavirus.
While grateful for the support – and of the belief schools with the most disadvantaged students should be prioritize –, North Carolina A&T’s Vice Chancellor for University Relations Todd Simmons pointed out HBCUs are not the institutions that are having the biggest outbreaks.
“But I would also say in the same breath, that if you look around America at the campuses that are having difficulties with COVID and coronavirus, that HBCUs and minority serving institutions more broadly, are not the places where you’re seeing the big problems,” Simmons told McClatchy.
He credited students being responsible and following social distancing guidelines so they don’t endanger their opportunity to get a good education.
“The strong majority of our students are first generation in college. College to them, may mean something different than it means to other students who may come from college attending families. They may see the opportunity with a greater sense of care,” Simmons said.
The lack of outbreaks at HBCUS could also be attributed to some of their decisions to offer fully remote learning as well as cancel extracurricular activities like fall sports, etc.
