Home health aides want respect as essential workers

Home caretakers and personal aides, who are overwhelmingly Latinas and Black women, are among the worst-paid workers in the U.S., even as the COVID-19 pandemic has shown the value of their care.

Why it matters: Most home health aides have no benefits, like Medicaid, and earn $10 to $13 an hour on average, which they say barely covers the cost of traveling to and from their house calls.

• The Biden administration’s jobs plan would raise wages for these workers, who “have been underpaid and undervalued for too long.”

What they’re saying: “We are part of the healthcare system, but by name only, not based on our access to rights,” health aide Orbelina del Carmen tells Noticias Telemundo.

• Del Carmen has no health coverage and got COVID-19 while on her job.