Black History Month

"Academic Medicine is committed to assisting medical schools and teaching hospitals, their faculty and trainees, and the public in dismantling racism. This collection of articles was curated with the intent to help readers engage in necessary conversations about race and to inform strategies to eliminate structural racism in their institution." This collection of articles is freely available to the public.

The American Journal of Bioethics dedicated this full issue (Volume 21, Issue 2) to racism in medicine and bioethics.

"The BMJ's special issue on racism in medicine reflects the working lives of doctors from ethnic minority backgrounds and the healthcare experiences of ethnic minority patients. This edition focuses on race and its impact on health. It is a timely reflection, as we in the UK try to make sense of the societal upheavals which have convulsed the country in recent times, and in which race, racism, and power have come under close scrutiny."

Health Affairs dedicated their entire February 2022 issue (Volume 41, Number 2), to racism and health.

"Explore the latest in health disparities, including differences in health status and health care access by race, sex, income, and geography."

"The new Anti-racism in Medicine Collection within MedEdPORTAL provides educators with practice-based, peer-reviewed resources to teach anti-racist knowledge and clinical skills, elevates the educational scholarship of anti-racist curricula, and aims to convene a community of collaborators dedicated to the elimination of racism within medical education. To specifically support developers of and educators in anti-racist curricula, we also offer individualized mentorship for potential authors. By increasing awareness, providing professional development, contextualizing content in culturally relevant ways, and spurring explicit dialogue about racism, our journal joins the fight against health inequity and racial injustice."

"The Race and Medicine collection reflects NEJM’s commitment to understanding and combating racism as a public health and human rights crisis. Our commitment to antiracism includes efforts to educate the medical community about systemic racism, to support physicians and aspiring physicians who are Black, Indigenous, and people of color, and ultimately to improve the care and lives of patients who are Black, Indigenous, and people of color."

Part of the series Unnatural Causes. "What are the connections between healthy bodies, healthy bank accounts and skin colour? Our opening episode travels to Louisville, Kentucky, not to explore whether medical care cures us, but to see why we get sick in the first place, and why patterns of health and illness reflect underlying patterns of class and racial inequities."

Part of the series Unnatural Causes. "Why is your street address such a good predictor of your health? Latino and Southeast Asian immigrants like Gwai Boonkeut have been moving into long-neglected urban neighborhoods such as those in Richmond, California, a predominantly Black city in the San Francisco Bay Area. Segregation and lack of access to jobs, nutritious foods, and safe, affordable housing have been harmful to the health of long-time African American residents, and now the newcomers' health is suffering too. As Harvard's David Williams reminds us, "Housing policy is health policy. Neighborhood improvement policies are health policies. Everything that we can do to improve the quality of life for individuals in our society has an impact on their health and is a health policy."

"At a time when health care dominates the news, there is a strong sense that good health is all about access to doctors, hospitals, medicine, and insurance. This thought-provoking and insightful documentary demonstrates otherwise. Using incisive case studies from around the world, it explores how people’s health and well-being is primarily determined by where they live, their educational, social, and economic status, and the degree of control they have over their lives. The film illustrates that these are the true roots of health – though generally overlooked in the contentious national debate over health care – and they can be improved dramatically for whole communities through social and political action. Roots of Health features three powerful stories filmed in London, England, Ahmedabad, India, and Oakland, California. Each story looks at the socio-economic conditions that contribute to illness, and how people can take charge of their own lives and health."

Part of the series Unnatural Causes. "The number of infants who die before their first birthday is much higher in the U.S. than in other countries. And, for African Americans, the rate is nearly twice as high than it is for white Americans. Even well-educated Black women have birth outcomes worse than white women who haven't finished high school. Why is this the case? WHEN THE BOUGH BREAKS explores this topic."

"SIGNING BLACK in AMERICA is the first documentary about Black ASL: the unique dialect of American Sign Language (ASL) that developed within historically segregated African American Deaf communities. Black ASL today conveys an identity and sense of belonging that mirrors spoken language varieties of the African American hearing community.  Different uses of space, hand use, directional movement, and facial expression are ways that Black ASL distinguishes itself as a vibrant dialect of American Sign Language. The African American Deaf community is now embracing their unique variety as a symbol of solidarity and a vital part of their identity. "

"Carolyn Roberts, Yale University historian of medicine, talks about some of the hidden histories of African American medical practitioners during slavery. Dr. Roberts explores how the enslaved used botanical knowledge, herbal therapies, and spirituality as ways to resist brutality, cure disease, and heal their communities. She vividly traces how the slave trade contributed to the development of the pharmaceutical industry, the modernization of medicine, and the advancement of natural history."

"Why does race matter so profoundly for health? David R. Williams developed a scale to measure the impact of discrimination on well-being, going beyond traditional measures like income and education to reveal how factors like implicit bias, residential segregation and negative stereotypes create and sustain inequality. In this eye-opening talk, Williams presents evidence for how racism is producing a rigged system -- and offers hopeful examples of programs across the US that are working to dismantle discrimination."

"Racism makes our economy worse -- and not just in ways that harm people of color, says public policy expert Heather C. McGhee. From her research and travels across the US, McGhee shares startling insights into how racism fuels bad policymaking and drains our economic potential -- and offers a crucial rethink on what we can do to create a more prosperous nation for all. "Our fates are linked," she says. "It costs us so much to remain divided."

"In Zimbabwe in the 1980s, Mary Bassett witnessed the AIDS epidemic firsthand, and she helped set up a clinic to treat and educate local people about the deadly virus. But looking back, she regrets not sounding the alarm for the real problem: the structural inequities embedded in the world's political and economic organizations, inequities that make marginalized people more vulnerable. These same structural problems exist in the United States today, and as New York City's Health Commissioner, Bassett is using every chance she has to rally support for health equity and speak out against racism. "We don't have to have all the answers to call for change," she says. "We just need courage."

"Social justice advocate and law scholar Dorothy Roberts has a precise and powerful message: Race-based medicine is bad medicine. Even today, many doctors still use race as a medical shortcut; they make important decisions about things like pain tolerance based on a patient's skin color instead of medical observation and measurement. In this searing talk, Roberts lays out the lingering traces of race-based medicine -- and invites us to be a part of ending it. "It is more urgent than ever to finally abandon this backward legacy," she says, "and to affirm our common humanity by ending the social inequalities that truly divide us."

"In the US, Black women are nearly 300 percent more likely to die as a result of childbirth than white women. Sharing appalling statistics on maternal mortality as well as her own tragic story of loss, Wanda Irving explains how racism and bias in health care minimizes and dismisses Black women's pain -- and makes a personal plea for leaders in the medical community to take steps toward reform."

"T. Morgan Dixon and Vanessa Garrison, founders of the health nonprofit GirlTrek, are on a mission to reduce the leading causes of preventable death among Black women -- and build communities in the process. How? By getting one million women and girls to prioritize their self-care, lacing up their shoes and walking in the direction of their healthiest, most fulfilled lives."

"Racism is making people sick -- especially black women and babies, says Miriam Zoila Pérez. The doula turned journalist explores the relationship between race, class and illness and tells us about a radically compassionate prenatal care program that can buffer pregnant women from the stress that people of color face every day."

"Ninety-six percent of genome studies are based on people of European descent. The rest of the world is virtually unrepresented -- and this is dangerous, says geneticist and TED Fellow Keolu Fox, because we react to drugs differently based on our genetic makeup. Fox is working to democratize genome sequencing, specifically by advocating for indigenous populations to get involved in research, with the goal of eliminating health disparities. "The research community needs to immerse itself in indigenous culture," he says, "or die trying."

"Cultural theorist Brittney Cooper examines racism through the lens of time, showing us how historically it has been stolen from people of color, resulting in lost moments of joy and connection, lost years of healthy quality of life and the delay of progress. A candid, thought-provoking take on history and race that may make you reconsider your understanding of time, and your place in it."