How one medical team is bringing COVID-19 vaccines to hard-to-reach Hispanic communities

In a makeshift tent behind a soccer goal and close enough to a taco stand that the smell of grilling barbacoa and carnitas drifts over, Melissa Pluguez cheerfully asks a man, in Spanish, if he’s right- or left-handed. The man, wearing jeans and a red T-shirt with white letters that spell Abercrombie, answers right, and confesses he’s a bit afraid of needles. Even so, he’s been eager to get a COVID-19 vaccine, Pluguez translates, but hasn’t felt comfortable going to vaccination sites around Philadelphia. But when he heard about this vaccination event — staffed by local, Spanish-speaking medical professionals and held at his church congregation’s regular Sunday gathering — he felt ready.