University of North Carolina School of Medicine Student Mask Infographic for NC Refugee and Immigrant Communities

Our goal is to provide an educational infographic regarding proper mask-wearing techniques in light of COVID-19 to English, Swahili, French, and Spanish-speaking refugee and immigrant communities in North Carolina. The idea for this project was originally inspired by a desire to support the hard hit meat-packing facilities in North Carolina, many of which are staffed by non-English-speaking workers. Through the planning phase, however, it was decided that providing an infographic to the larger refugee and immigrant communities as well would have a larger impact. Through providing an educational infographic in languages spoken by these workers and those in their surrounding community, we hope to reduce COVID-19 transmission throughout North Carolina and to help safeguard one of the community’s important industries. Distribution of the infographic was coordinated with refugee resettlement and assistant groups in the region, including North Carolina African Services Coalition. Orange, Durham, and Wake County Health Departments have been contacted as an additional means of distribution. This project is being coordinated by current M2 students who participated in weekly COVID-19 seminars designed and coordinated by current M3s and M4s interested in medical education. The seminar course was overseen by Kurt Gilliland, PhD, Associate Dean of Curriculum.