Jun 16, 2020
Early in the US outbreak of COVID-19, New Orleans was struck hard. At one point, the city of about 400,000 people was seeing up to 450 cases diagnosed per day. Today, it has reduced cases 95% from that peak. Dr. Jennifer Avegno, director of the Health Department in New Orleans, said this is due in no small part to New Orleans’s history of disaster and the infrastructure and partnerships that were put in place following Hurricane Katrina. Avegno talks with Dr. Josh Sharfstein about how New Orleans pulled out of the tailspin, what the city continues to do to keep cases down, and why protesting is an “essential” activity.