Using Disadvantage Indices to Guide State Health Equity Efforts: On-the-Ground Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic

Increasingly, policymakers are exploring how disadvantage indices can help guide efforts to dismantle structural discrimination by identifying—and then allocating resources more equitably to—marginalized communities that disproportionately lack equal access to health care, education, safe housing, and other social determinants of health. This brief summarizes a June 2021 AcademyHealth workshop where public health officials shared their on-the ground experiences using disadvantage indices to locate COVID-19 testing sites, allocate vaccines, set up vaccination sites, and conduct community outreach to overcome vaccine hesitancy.