02-21-2024 PTL - Flipbook - Page 21
A Special Advertising Section of Baltimore Sun Media Group | Wednesday, February 21, 2024 21
Cohousing,
continued from page 15
Vaccinations,
continued from page 7
An interview with Lois Privor-Dumm
By Margit B. Weisgal, Contributing Writer
Lois Privor-Dumm, MBA, works
to expand access to vaccines, trains
advocates to speak on the value of
immunization and evaluates the use of
policy to protect communities. Now at
Johns Hopkins University, her teaching focuses on vaccine policy and
advocacy and she has trained hundreds of country-level professionals.
We talked about the disparities in
access to vaccinations. Privor-Dumm
oversaw Baltimore City Vaccine Peer
Ambassadors (VPAs), teams that
went into neighborhoods to promote
health, build trust and recommend
vaccinations.
“How cohousing can make us happier
(and live longer),” she opens with a single
word: Loneliness. She goes on to say,
“It’s not a function of being alone, but
rather a function of how socially connected you are to those around you.”
Cohousing, she extols, is a solution, an
intentional neighborhood where people
know each other and care about each
other because they want to. “In cohousing, people live independently and interdependently.”
Intentional Housing
The Cohousing Association of the US
(CohoUS), the national nonprofit umbrella
organization promoting this way of living,
says “Seniors-only communities follow
all the same norms as other cohousing
communities, including shared management and maintenance of the property,
common meals, several common areas
and smaller individual homes, supplemented by several shared spaces and
amenities.
“It’s a lifestyle choice where living
in a close-knit, intentional community
improves health, reduces the need for
senior services, fosters rewarding relationships, and makes life more affordable and fun. And like intergenerational
cohousing, senior cohousing is a solution
to today’s social and environmental challenges.”
Cohousing doesn’t cut you off from
the neighborhoods around you. You are
still a part of them. But now you are surrounded by caring collaborative neighbors who use less of the earth’s resources while living an abundant life.
Over the centuries and around the
world, different versions of cohousing
have evolved. This modern version started in Denmark in the 1960s when the
term “cohousing” was coined. They are
formed for various purposes. In this case,
Cohousing of Greater Baltimore is creating a way for adults to age in place in a
neighborhood with like-minded people
who band together and serve each other.
It’s an idea whose time has come.
For more information:
Boomers Do It Differently:
Creating Your Own 55+
Cohousing Community
A presentation by cohousing
expert Katie McCamant
Wednesday, February 28
7 PM ET, Free
Stony Run Friends Meeting
5116 N Charles St.
Baltimore, MD 21210
www.cohousingofgreaterbaltimore.
org/events
Privor-Dumm’s Insight as
Shared in the Interview
There are lots of reasons why people don’t get vaccinated. The population we targeted is not homogenous
and we tend to lump people together
whether they should be or not. Some
who resisted vaccinations did have
commonalities: a lack of trust, prior
mistreatment by a medical professional, they live in a care desert, and/
or the quality of care may be questionable.
This is why we worked with the
Baltimore City Health Department
(BCHD) to create the VPAs, community members who can respond to
different issues. This started during
the pandemic when vaccinations provided protection for a very vulnerable
population. We trained them on the
various vaccines so they could communicate with vaccine-hesitant people. Hesitant people, including some
that got the vaccine, perceived risks
associated with the vaccine product
or mistrusted the infrastructure that
led to rapid vaccine development and
the push for vaccination. The community often had other priorities, which
to them were more important than
the vaccine. The learning between
community and the program was
often mutual.
With the goal of ensuring people
have the health care they need, we
learned that they have to be respected
and have their questions answered,
something providers didn’t always
address, and we had to listen to them.
It’s important to hear people through,
not to dismiss them. At the end of the
day, they may not agree; they have to
decide for themselves.
We also discovered that the resistance is not always about the vaccination. Sometimes, their lives got in the
way, and a vaccination is the last thing
they think about.
When we created the VPA program, we brought in people from the
communities we were trying to reach
to help us develop our messaging, to
make it relevant to them. Questions
we discussed included:
• How do we get the information across to others so they can
make an informed decision?
• How do we talk about decision(s)
that may put others at risk?
• What does the community want
to know?
In some cases, the vaccination
was the least of the problems. Their
responsibilities were far more important and if, for some reason, there
was a reaction to the shot, it would
cause other problems – the inability
to put food on the table, for instance,
or to take care of the family. This was
particularly true during the pandemic
when it was life or death.
In the end, our program was pretty
successful. BCHD ran vaccine clinics
where people lived and worked with
people that were trusted so hesitant
compliers were more willing to get
the vaccination. Given how virulent
COVID-19 was during the pandemic, convincing this vulnerable group
saved lives.
