Four Indian Americans and one Pakistani American are among the 23 new members of President Joe Biden’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders, which will be housed in the Department of Health and Human Services.
Vice President Kamala Harris joined Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra and US Trade Rep. Katherine Tai Feb. 3 to swear in the new appointees, who immediately engaged in a three-day summit to discuss issues critical to the AAPI community, including an alarming rise in hate crimes, and a disproportionate number of hospitalizations and deaths from the Omicron variant, even though Asian Americans overall have the highest percentage of vaccination rates.
