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Dear colleagues,

As we approach our third year of the COVID-19 pandemic and experience another surge due to the highly contagious omicron variant, our team members continue to show up every day, ready to provide the exceptional care our patients expect from UVA Health. We realize the prolonged pandemic has had a profound impact on our team members’ well-being, and we have tremendous gratitude for our teams’ steadfast commitment to our patients.

To support our teams, UVA Health and Augusta Health are coming together to launch a public education campaign to appeal to our local communities to do their part. In this new campaign, we portray the reality of the current situation in our hospitals and care facilities and ask our community members to take all measures available to increase the health and safety of our communities — getting vaccinated, boosted, wearing a mask, and considering alternative locations for COVID testing instead of our busy emergency departments.

We’ve issued a statement to the media from our Medical Center CEO Wendy Horton and Mary Mannix, the CEO of Augusta Health, as a plea to the community for their help. In partnership with Augusta Health, we hosted a media briefing yesterday, to be followed by the launch of a bold public education campaign that will run across major news outlets in our respective markets, including a full-page ad in the Daily Progress.

We sincerely hope this effort will compel our communities to take action to support our healthcare workers.

With extraordinary gratitude,

K. Craig Kent, MD
Chief Executive Officer, UVA Health
Executive Vice President for Health Affairs, University of Virginia

Pam Cipriano, PhD
Dean, UVA School of Nursing

Wendy Horton, PharmD, MBA
Chief Executive Officer, UVA Medical Center

Melina Kibbe, MD
Dean, UVA School of Medicine