21-Day Racial Equity & Social Justice Challenge | Premier Health

Welcome! And thank you for making dedicated time and space to build more effective social justice habits in this specially curated 21-Day Racial Equity and Social Justice Challenge, built exclusively for Premier Health.

YWCA Dayton is our region’s oldest intersectional, multicultural social services organization, having worked to eliminate racism and empower women for 151 years. We stand in solidarity with our community against racism and commit to education and systemic solutions. During the next three weeks, we will focus on cultural competency surrounding social determinants of health. Together, we are On a Mission to eliminate racism, empower women, and promote peace, justice, freedom, and dignity for all.

You will receive weekly exercises to help you: foster understanding and awareness; discover how racial inequity and social injustice impact our community; connect with one another; and identify ways to dismantle racism and oppression within a healthcare setting. It will also help you as a network create an inclusive culture, hold meaningful conversations about injustice, and take small actions alongside one another to create momentum and teamwork.

As you dig deeper into this heart work, please consider the importance of taking care of yourself. The realities of our society may induce uncomfortable feelings, emotions, and stress. It is normal to feel uncomfortable, but it is necessary to sit in that space for growth to occur. It is also necessary to incorporate self-care to navigate through those feelings; we’ve provided some resources at the end of this email.

Before you get started, please complete this pre-Challenge survey to set your intentions and share your goals for the Challenge with us. We also encourage you to download your 21-Day Challenge Reflection Log — it’s a tool to ensure you are taking full advantage of what the Challenge has to offer.

THIS WEEK’S CHALLENGE: THE LENS OF ANTIRACISM

In order to address racism, especially within the spheres we inhabit and have influence, we need people who understand it, can address it, and will challenge it. As activist and scholar Ibram X. Kendi writes in How to Be an Antiracist, “The opposite of racist isn’t ‘not racist.’ It is ‘anti-racist.'”

Antiracism is the practice of actively identifying and opposing racism; the goal is to actively change policies, behaviors, and beliefs that perpetuate racist ideas and actions. The CDC reports that centuries of racism in the U.S. has had a profound and negative impact on communities of color. The impact is pervasive and deeply embedded in our society — affecting where one lives, learns, works, worships, and plays and creating inequities in access to a range of social and economic benefits, such as housing, education, wealth, and employment. These conditions — known as social determinants of health — are key drivers of health inequities and result in greater risk for poor health outcomes.

Racial and ethnic minority groups experience higher rates of illness and death across a wide range of health conditions, including diabetes, hypertension, obesity, asthma, and heart disease, when compared to their White counterparts. Additionally, the life expectancy of non-Hispanic/Black Americans is four years lower than that of white Americans. The COVID-19 pandemic, and its disproportionate impact among racial and ethnic minority populations, is another stark example of these enduring health disparities.

Racism also contributes to gaps in leadership in the scientific and medical community, restricting the talent, expertise, and perspectives needed to adequately address racial and ethnic health disparities. To build a healthier community for all, we must confront the systems and policies that have resulted in these generational injustices.

Our community needs and deserves healthcare professionals who practice through a lens of antiracism. Start this week’s challenge by walking through these interactive exercises from The National Museum of African American History and Culture to begin applying an antiracist mindset.

IF YOU HAVE…

• 5 Minutes: Watch this illustration that looks at how social structures construct, limit, and place value on identities.
• 10 Minutes: Watch this video that looks at how doctors treat their patients differently, depending on the patient’s race.
• 15 Minutes: Read this article on the power of white privilege and how it can be shared to promote change in academic medicine.
• 30 Minutes: Read this American Psychologist piece about implications of microagressions (brief and commonplace verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities) for clinical practice.
• 45 Minutes: What determinants of health affect patients in the Miami Valley? Explore local data that examines area health disparities with this community needs assessment and infant mortality report.

THIS WEEK’S CHALLENGE: RACISM AS A PUBLIC HEALTH CRISIS

Last week, we took a deep dive into the history of oppression and a glance into how that translates into racial disparities that then show up in healthcare settings. Week 2 is going to walk us through the systemic issues of racism, particularly as it pertains to the history of the United States medical field. We’ll also look at legislation that has led to a racial wealth gap and under-resourced communities by design, its longstanding impact, and how it continues today.

For these reasons, many areas around the United States have begun to acknowledge racism as a public health crisis. For YWCA Dayton — an organization dedicated to thrusting our collective power toward the elimination of racism, wherever it exists, by any means necessary — we believe that declaring racism as a public health crisis is the long-term policy response that can outlast this particular moment, redress the wrongs of the past, and shepherd us into a healthier, more equitable future.

IF YOU HAVE…

• 5 Minutes: Watch this explainer video that looks at the compounding factors that create a racial wealth gap.
• 10 Minutes: The U.S. medical system is still haunted by slavery — watch this video to understand how, and why.
• 15 Minutes: Watch this news segment that explains how experiencing racism impacts health.
• 20 Minutes: Listen to this TED talk on the underlying racism of America’s food system and its impact on health.
• 1 Hour: Read about cellular memory and how disparities in African American health persist transgenerationally.