The goal of this competitive revision was to expand the original project to adapt, implement, and evaluate a multi-level intervention to mitigate the multi-dimensional toll of COVID-19 among Latino immigrant communities in Philadelphia. Evidence of effective strategies to curb the pandemic, reduce disparities, and mitigate its impact was lacking and urgently needed.

In the United States, Latino immigrants were one of the groups hardest hit by the pandemic, with recent steep increases in COVID-19 deaths among this group corroborating their continued increased risk of infection and increased susceptibility. Latino immigrants had long exhibited disparities in diabetes, obesity, and hypertension, factors known to increase COVID-19 related severity, and also in Substance Abuse, Violence exposure, HIV/AIDS, and Mental health (SAVAME) syndemic. These syndemic conditions were worsened in the context of COVID-19. Latino immigrants represented a hard-to-reach and marginalized population, with extremely limited access to adequate health care and safety nets. This group faced many structural barriers and social vulnerabilities that hindered their capacity to access COVID-19 testing and treatment services and to adhere to public health interventions and measures to decrease the spread of COVID-19.

Latinos often relied on a thin and fragmented network of health and social services organizations. Intervention to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on this population needed broad stakeholder engagement and had to address a wide range of health determinants. Peer-driven interventions had been effective for the prevention and control of infectious diseases such as HIV and STIs among Latino populations. Strengthening the links between community members and these organizations and promoting inter-organizational coordination to meet syndemic health, behavioral, economic, and legal needs of Latino communities were essential elements to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on this low-resource population.

In direct response to the NOT-MD-20-022/PAR PA-18-935, the ongoing community-academic partnership aimed to evaluate “CRISOL Contigo,” a multi-level intervention to address the needs created or magnified by the COVID-19 pandemic among Latino communities in Philadelphia. CRISOL Contigo included a peer-driven program and mobilization of Latino-serving organizations.