The Minneapolis City Council adopted a Minnesota Department of Health grant that will expand medical and mental health providers in high school clinics, according to a city council meeting on November 9, 2021.

By Mikayla Scrignoli

The grant will provide up to $900,000 from Nov. 15, 2021, to June 30, 2023, to increase health education and medical and mental health providers in the Minneapolis Public School clinics, among other things, according to a Public Health and Safety committee file.

The grant is a subgrantee from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) School Health Workforce grant. These are funds allocated from the American Rescue Plan that President Biden signed in March 2021, according to the CDC website.

The council’s Public Health and Safety Committee approved the grant on Oct. 28, 2021, and the entire council unanimously voted to adopt the grant on Friday, both city council meetings showed. 

The grant still needs to be reviewed by Mayor Jacob Frey, according to the city council website. The mayor’s office did not respond to the request for comment on when he would review the grant.

The clinics are located in seven Minneapolis public high schools, and the health services are free to all of the students, according to the Minneapolis School-Based Clinic website. The services range from medical and mental healthcare to dental and eye care.

The grant aims to increase medical and mental health providers to tackle the increased health needs due to COVID-19, according to the grant’s background analysis. 

During the past year of the pandemic, the clinics had a decrease of 50% in new students using the program and a 70% decrease in students seeking services like vaccinations, STI testing and physical exams, according to the grant’s COVID-19 racial equity impact analysis.

The grant will help the clinics expand availability to students, and increase providers and staff hours. It also seeks to expand COVID-19 education to help all students know how to mitigate the transmission of the virus, according to the school-based document.

The funds will allow the implementation of new services in the FAIR and Wellstone high schools, which are over 80% students of color and will expand access to COVID-19 care, testing and vaccinations, according to the school-based narrative document.

There are racial disparities in Minneapolis with COVID-19 infections being higher and vaccine rates in communities of color being lower, according to data from the COVID-19 racial equity analysis.

The pandemic heightened mental health struggles for all Minnesotans, including high school students, according to data from the CDC.

“Right now, our young people are so deeply struggling with mental health issues as a result of COVID, the pandemic, stay-at-home orders, the civil unrest, all of the trauma that we have gone through,” Councilman Philippe Cunningham said during the Oct. 28 committee meeting. “Our young people are really feeling that. And now that there is a greater demand, we have the capacity for it.”