A call to action for public health nurses during the COVID‐19 pandemic

Public health nurses (PHNs) are on the frontline of the public health crisis the world now knows as the COVID-19 pandemic. They serve on mobile strike teams investigating case-contacts, deliver education on self-isolation and quarantine through hotlines and home visits, and interpret the rapidly shifting guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). They are reliable and proven responders during infectious disease emergencies, providing safe, effective, and nondiscriminatory care to the communities in which they serve. Yet, despite their critical role, PHN positions have been underfunded, left vacant, eliminated, or replaced over the past three decades. Combined with outsourcing services to agencies that lack the public health mandate and institutional experience necessary to provide public health services to communities, the erosion of the PHN workforce has made us all more vulnerable to both chronic disease and emerging infectious disease threats.