Equitable COVID-19 vaccine distribution has been a top priority for UW Health. As vaccines were rolling out to the general public, UW Health worked not only to distribute vaccinations to as many patients as possible, but the health system took specific, meaningful steps to reach communities of color. 

UW Health hired community health workers specifically from the Black/African American, Latinx and Hmong communities and created a workflow within Epic for the community health workers to identify medically homed patients from those communities. The community health workers proactively called those patients to answer questions and offer COVID-19 vaccine appointments. The UW Health COVID-19 vaccine community health workers reached over 4,300 unique patients from March 2021 through June 2022.

UW Health also partnered with community organizations serving communities of color for population-specific vaccination clinics. On one day in April, the health system partnered with the Wisconsin Latino Chamber of Commerce to vaccinate almost 200 essential workers in Dane County. 

UW Health partnered with many other community groups to hold COVID-19 vaccination clinics across Dane County. In addition to dedicated vaccine equity clinics, UW Health provided culturally and linguistically relevant information about COVID-19 vaccines to ensure that communities of color had access to reliable information and feel empowered to make informed decisions related to vaccination.