Fund to Aid Families of Health Workers Who Were Killed by COVID-19

According to this article from the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP), the Saint Paul & Minnesota Foundation (SPMF) recently announced the creation of the Frontline Families Fund and launch of the frontlinefamiliesfund.org website in partnership with epidemiologist Michael Osterholm, PhD, MPH, director of CIDRAP. The Frontline Families Fund is designed to support the families of nearly 1,400 US frontline healthcare workers who have lost their lives to COVID-19. Assistance will be provided through direct grants and scholarships for post-secondary education. The fund was created to recognize the contributions and sacrifices of frontline healthcare workers and their families, and also seeks to highlight the pandemic’s disproportionate burden on black and indigenous Americans and other people of color.

Osterholm explains that the loss of healthcare workers is uniquely painful for families who are used to seeing their loved one as a rescuer or protector. “They were the ones who gave people confidence. They were there to protect everyone else against COVID-19, and now they died from it. And there’s just a very sad irony to that,” he noted. “We can’t change what’s happened but we can at least be there to help support them, and I think that this particular fund is at the right time for the right reason,” Osterholm added.