ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Public Health
Sec. Disaster and Emergency Medicine
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1589091
The invisible frontline: Experiences of Public Health Workers during the COVID-19 pandemic and health emergencies in Colombia
Provisionally accepted
Sandra Martínez-Cabezas1*
Adriana Díaz del Castillo1Johana Linares-García2
Natalia Nino-Machado1Javier Idrovo2Myriam Rodríguez2
Catalina González-Uribe1*- 1University of Los Andes, Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia
- 2Industrial University of Santander, Bucaramanga, Santander, Colombia
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Background: During the COVID-19 pandemic, frontline workers were widely recognized for their efforts, with an emphasis largely placed on clinical personnel providing individual care. However, public health workers, who played a critical role in managing the pandemic from a population wide perspective, received far less attention. This paper explores the experiences of public health frontline (PHF) workers in Colombia during the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting their role in virus identification, surveillance, and guiding public health responses. Methods: Using a qualitative approach with semi-structured interviews (n=83), we examine the challenges faced by the PHF, their strategies for adapting to the crisis, and the impact of the work overload they encountered. Results: The structural conditions that influenced public health responses in Colombia, shedding light on the necessity of a robust public health workforce for emergency preparedness. All the work realized to respond from a collective health perspective was performed by a PHF who felt that they were invisible. This invisibility had to do with the precarious working conditions that predated the pandemic, but also with a sense of being undervalued or not publicly recognized and thanked for -as opposed to clinical healthcare workers-, since public health was not necessarily considered part of the “COVID frontline”. Conclusion: The lack of a clear definition of the public health frontline during the pandemic rendered essential workers in this sector invisible, leading to less recognition compared to clinical healthcare staff and affecting their well-being, safety, and motivation.
Keywords: Health Policy, Health workers, health professionals, Health Systems, Health
Received: 07 Mar 2025; Accepted: 24 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Martínez-Cabezas, Díaz del Castillo, Linares-García, Nino-Machado, Idrovo, Rodríguez and González-Uribe. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Sandra Martínez-Cabezas, University of Los Andes, Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia
Catalina González-Uribe, University of Los Andes, Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia
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