Momentum is building for the People's Pandemic Prevention Plan, and our political leaders are taking notice. To advance crucial pandemic prevention policies, we are hosting a Town Hall Meeting with the Biden-Harris Campaign.

 

We'll learn from the Biden-Harris Campaign about their plan to stop COVID-19, build back better, and prevent the pandemics of the future. We'll hear from Kristin Urquiza about her work to lift up the stories of families of those killed by policymakers' murderous inaction. At the end of the Town Hall, we’ll learn how to help the Biden campaign with remote get out the vote (GOTV) efforts, including voter texting, phone banking, and other activities. We will also talk about other upcoming organizing for the People’s Pandemic Prevention Plan, including a massive advocacy push on Capitol Hill for the plan from Sen. Warren and Rep. Khanna. 
 
Together, we're fighting for the People's Pandemic Prevention Plan: a package of policies designed to justly end the current pandemic and prevent the pandemics that are coming in COVID-19's wake. We're calling for 1) a 300k-strong permanent public health jobs corps to rebuild American public health, 2) ensuring that COVID-19 vaccines and medicines are available to everyone, everywhere, 3) global health funding to support low and middle income countries to stop pandemics where they start, before they spread, and 4) ending the corporate drivers of accelerating zoonotic transmission through regulation banning deforestation and support for communities to protect indigenous environments.

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The speakers included:

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HEATHER BOOTH

Director of Progressive & 
Senior Outreach for the Biden Campaign

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Heather Booth is one of the leading strategists about progressive issue and electoral campaigns.

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She has been an organizer starting in the civil rights, anti-Vietnam War and women’s movements of the 1960s and continuing through today. She created JANE, an underground abortion service started before Roe.

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She was the founding Director and is now President of the Midwest Academy, training social change leaders and organizers. She has been involved in political campaigns and was the Training Director of the Democratic National Committee. In 2000, she was the Director of the NAACP National Voter Fund, which helped to increase African American election turnout by nearly 2 million voters. She was the lead consultant, directing the founding of the Campaign for Comprehensive Immigration Reform in 2005.

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In 2008, Heather was the director of the Health Care Campaign for the AFL-CIO. In 2009, she directed the campaign passing President Obama’s first budget. In 2010, she was the founding director of Americans for Financial Reform, fighting to regulate the financial industry. She was the National Coordinator for the coalition around marriage equality and the 2013 Supreme Court decision. She was strategic advisor to the Alliance for Citizenship (the largest coalition of the immigration reform campaign). She was Field Director for Americans for Tax Fairness to stop the tax cuts for millionaires that may lead to cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, and education.

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She is a member of the consulting group Democracy Partners.

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KRISTIN URQUIZA

Co-founder & Chief Activist of

Marked By COVID

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​Kristin’s parents contracted COVID-19 in June, following Donal Trump and Arizona Governor Doug Ducey’s downplay of the severity of the coronavirus and premature re-openings in Arizona and around the country. When her father passed away on June 30 from COVID-19, Kristin launched Marked by COVID to honor her father, collect stories of people who have been impacted by COVID-19,

and inspire the systemic policy changes we need to transform our world beyond COVID 19 so this never happens again.

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With the help of friends and family, she wrote the first #HonestObit, invited the governor to her dad’s funeral, and a held a vigil at the state capitol. She was invited by Joe Biden to address the Democratic National Convention, and, I can say personally, gave one of the most powerful speeches.

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Kristin’s grandparents were migrant farmworkers– from Mexico and Oklahoma — and her father worked in the fields as a child. She grew up in the Maryvale community of Phoenix, and is a proud product of public primary education and the first person in her family to go to college: Yale University. Maryvale is a community of predominantly people of color and immigrants, and is now seeing the highest rates of COVID-19 in the nation, where people are waiting 13 hours to be tested.

 

MODERATED BY HANNAH LICHTSINN, MD​

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Hannah Lichtsinn, MD, FAAP, is an internist and pediatrician in Minneapolis MN where she is building a comprehensive adult sickle cell program. She is also an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of MN. This fall she is joining the faculty of Hennepin Health to build a comprehensive adult sickle cell program. She is a co-founder of the Minnesota Immigrant Health Alliance (MIHA), co-chair of the healthcare advocacy organization Our Stories. Our Health., and board member of the MN chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics (MNAAP). She is also a 2020-2021 Leaders in Health Policy Fellow with the Society of General Internal Medicine (SGIM). ​​

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