As the 2021 new year begins, we find ourselves in unusual and uncertain times unlike any other we have ever faced in our lifetime. The COVID-19 pandemic has changed all of us. From wearing masks and standing 6 feet apart to zoom meetings and socially distanced holidays, we have all adapted our habits in order to protect those with whom we come into contact.

In times such as these, the challenges we face seem overwhelming, but I have never been more honored to be a part of UniHealth. Our team has responded to the challenges we face in these difficult times with ingenuity and compassion.

In March, we converted to an online platform making it easier for our grantees to connect with our staff, as well as easier for staff to work from home. We adapted our grantmaking systems to allow us to deploy rapid response funding of over $2 million dollars to address the COVID-19 crisis. We have encouraged our grantees to reach out to us to re-purpose funding to better address the immediate and most pressing needs of the communities they serve. And we worked closely with our funding partners to align our dollars to have the greatest community impact.

We have done all of this while continuing our ongoing grantmaking work. We have been and continue to be a leading responsive grantmaker and for the past number of years we have been seeking to address a different kind of crisis in our community – the crisis of homelessness and health that has continued to worsen in recent years. Over the past two years we have been building a learning and funding community focused on the linkage of people experiencing homelessness from hospital to recuperative care to housing. And this will continue to be a priority for us in the coming year.

As we turn our attention towards the next year, UniHealth Foundation remains committed to our mission of supporting and facilitating activities that significantly improve the health and well-being of individuals and communities. We enter this year with a renewed commitment to our mission with an enlightened understanding of our collective health as being interconnected.

Our name UniHealth means “one health.” We are all in this together. Our health is one health and our community is one community.