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-Elizabeth Chinery, Junior Community Outreach Coordinator

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/14/upshot/gender-stereotypes-survey-girls-boys.html

NYTimes.com (Many Ways to Be a Girl, but One Way to Be a Boy: The New Gender Rules)

The issue of gender inequality starts with what we teach our children. We as a society need to start promoting inclusive mindsets. In this case, an inclusive mindset is one that promotes value in an individual regardless of gender and preserved “gender roles.” A female who dresses in a more relaxed fashion (no makeup, sweatpants, baggy clothes,, etc.) is no less beautiful than one that dresses in clothing such as blouses, skirts, high heels, etc. A male who is a stay-at-home dad isn’t less “manly” than one who is the breadwinner for his family. We as a society need to start taking labels (such as “being manly” or “acting/dressing like a lady”) out of our vocabulary. An individual (who is not harming anyone in anyway) should be able to love the way they look and behave without being bombarded by the rude and insulting commentary many receive for not conforming to their so called “gender role.”

-Elizabeth Chinery, Junior Community Outreach Coordinator

LaTimes.com (Healthcare isn’t a game. The Texas ACA lawsuit could be catastrophic for public health)

“Since the Affordable Care Act was signed into law in 2010, America’s access to healthcare has improved dramatically. Roughly 20 million Americans have gained health insurance coverage. Medicare beneficiaries can now get free preventive care and pay less for prescription drugs. And no one can be denied coverage based on preexisting conditions.” Over $8 billion in funding from the ACA has gone into the Prevention and Public Health Fund, which has “supported efforts to immunize children, ensure our water is safe to drink, help people quit smoking and prevent drug addiction.”

-Elizabeth Chinery, Junior Community Outreach Coordinator

CNN.com

Being a vegetarian can still result in an unhealthy lifestyle if not executed properly. For example, a lot of people who go in to vegetarianism think it just means eliminating meat and consuming more vegetables and fruits. However, many like Tia Miller (the writer of the article below) consume vegetables that are botanically classified as a vegetable but nutritionally classified as a starchy food; for example, consuming potatoes in the form of “french fries, chips, mashed potatoes, baked potatoes, sweet potatoes”. Miller even admits to eating “fruit snacks” as her intake of fruits. Even if you are someone who doesn’t do these things, consuming “veggie meat” on a regular basis is just as harmful since the majority of them are chemically processed, just like many non-veggie meats. Miller says that the combination of these three eating habits caused her to “struggle with severe anemia, ADHD and fatigue” within a year of her switch to vegetarianism. She would even “break [her] vegetarianism and eat a chicken breast, a burger or salmon to feel better. Meat would solve the problem, but it also made [her] bloated and constipated and gave [her] headaches.”

Therefore, when switching to a vegetarian diet it is recommended that you still follow the basic nutrition rules of every meal. “The US Department of Agriculture recommends filling half your plate with fruits and vegetables at each meal” (make sure to switch up the fruits and vegetables you eat, consuming a variety of different ones with every or every other meal). Since as a vegetarian, you will be lacking in the nutrients provided by meat, “particularly iron and B12”, this is very crucial. Dr. Brandi Jouett-Patrickson, an internal medicine doctor with Piedmont Physicians Group, recommends that vegetarians “[consume] green leafy vegetables such as broccoli, spinach and kale [to[ help head off iron deficiency” and dairy to avoid B12 deficiency, and vegans should “use a B12 vitamin or fortified foods such as plant milks, soy products and some breakfast cereals.”

-Elizabeth Chinery, Junior Community Outreach Coordinator

CNN.com (22-year-old Naomi Musenga who is told by a French emergency response operator that ‘everyone dies’ later dies shortly dies after arriving in a hospital)

https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/11/health/france-ambulance-call-mocked-trnd/index.html

This story is a bit old but is still very disturbing nonetheless.

In France, a 22-year-old woman calls emergency services and during the call she is unable to properly describe her symptoms due to the excruciating pain she is experiencing and is only able to say that she is is pain and she feels like she is going to die. The operator’s response? “Yes…you will die, certainly, one day, like everybody else.” A family member later calls a doctor who then takes her to a hospital where she soon dies after two heart attacks.

-Elizabeth Chinery, Junior Community Outreach Coordinator

UN World Food Programme

Established in 1961, the UN’s World Food Programme was originally an experiment created to provide food aid to countries during times of desperate need or following a crisis. Its current  commitment is to end hunger, achieve food security, and improve nutrition by 2030, focusing on “emergency assistance, relief and rehabilitation, development aid and special operations” to reach this goal.

Purchasing over 2 million metric tons of food each year and sending out 5,000 trucks, 20 ships, and 92 planes each day, WFP is able to distribute approximately 12.6 billion rations of food to 80 million people in around 80 countries each year, raking up an average cost of only .31 US dollars per ration. Of these 80 million people include between 20 and 25 million children across 63 countries who are provided school meals every year.

WFP’s efforts do not stop there:

• Even after the subside of an emergency, WFP stays behind to help communities “rebuild shattered lives and livelihoods [and works hard] to strengthen the resilience of [the] people and communities affected by protracted crises.”
• To ensure the authenticity and intergrity of the organziation, WFP “created an Ethics Office in 2008 to ensure that all staff members observe and perform their functions with the highest standards of integrity, as required by the Charter of the United Nations, and in accordance with the Standards of Conduct for the International Civil Service” and “adopted a Whistleblower Protection Policy” to protect individuals who report internal misconduct and wrongdoing as well as “cooperate with a duly authorized audit or investigation.”

Give a donation and support WFP’s goal of ending world hunger by 2030 by clicking the link below!

https://support.wfpusa.org/site/Donation2?df_id=4181&4181.donation=form1&s_src=UNR0000EXwfp

For more information about WFP and its cause:

http://www1.wfp.org/

-Ron Lapitan, Former Community Outreach Coordinator

Today, the Center for Health and Human Rights’ staff were privileged to meet with Dr. Alicia Yamin who took time to visit our clinic. A professor of law at Georgetown University and  leading scholar on health and human rights, she has worked in countries around the world studying issues such as poverty and the health impacts of gender inequality.

She is interested in supporting our high school program, sharing our philosophy that youth are particularly important to engage in the dream of a culture of health and human rights because the values of the youth will become the culture of the future. “I think youth are the experts about what it is like to live in their reality. They just need to be given the words to tell their stories,” she said.

In between her work with the UN and other social development groups, she has graciously agreed to commit time to meeting with our high school teams throughout the year, especially our ESL students, to learn about their experience and empower them to cultivate their voice to articulate their experience of human rights or lack thereof.

As she left, she autographed our copy of her latest book on our office bookshelf, “Power, Suffering, and the Struggle for Dignity: Human Rights Frameworks for Health and Why They Matter.”

“In development and social policy, health has conventionally been construed in terms other than ‘as a right,’ so it is worth exploring what it would mean for… anyone – to claim health as a right.”

-Dr. Yamin, Power, Suffering, and the Struggle for Dignity

Today, the Center for Health and Human Rights traveled to one of the schools in our program to do free sports physicals so the students could enroll in sports. The student body of the International High School in Langley Park in Maryland is 100% immigrants and refugees, most of whom are without insurance. “A sports physical costs $80-$100,” commented Dr. Milani​ as we drove to the school. In all, we saw about twenty students, about $2,000 in free services.

In the beginning, the school was a series of trailer classrooms. As the school rapidly grows, they have moved to a larger brick building. School staff led us to some empty rooms which had not yet been furnished, which we converted into stations to take vitals, test urine samples, and run other tests to pass the athletes for sports. Then we began calling students from the hall, bustling with eager young athletes.

I checked their forms as they left the clinic. “Can you give me the answer now?” asked one boy nervously as I checked his papers. “Am I able to play?”
“You’re all set,” I said with a smile, looking over the doctor’s notes. His face brightened, and he walked out with his head high. Then I felt the importance of these exams to the students. To participate in sports is an opportunity to grow, to nurture the personality. Is the need to grow any less essential to these students than to those at any of the other, more privileged high schools in our program?

“This is one of my soccer players,” said Vice-Principal Sass who doubles as the soccer coach, who explained that one of his boys did a sports physical at a minute clinic, which didn’t pass him because of a high heart rate. Then he took a cardio test which showed that his heart had returned to normal, but he would not be able to see his doctor until November to retake the exam and pass for sports.
“Can he take the test with you, or does he have to wait for his other doctor?” Mr. Sass asked Dr. Milani.
“Then he’ll pay another $80,” answered Dr. Milani quickly. “We’ll see him here.” Our doctors never say no.

“Is my heartbeat-friend okay?” asked Mr. Sass with a humorous tone as the boy left the testing area. Dr. Milani approved him.
“Then I’ll see you at practice tomorrow,” said Mr. Sass, patting him on the shoulder.

“I would be happy to see him again at our clinic. Absolutely free,” said Dr. Milani to a boy who didn’t pass the exam and his coach, even offering to drive him if he had no means of transport.

It changes you, watching the selflessness of our staff, smiling widely and laughing fully as they work because using their skills to serve is their element. We are at home with the staff of this school, who also thrive on the joy of giving of themselves to watch others grow. To develop as whole individuals with a sense of their full potentials.

“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.”

-Mahatma Ghandi

(Image: Nurse assistant Tinoosh​ prepare’s to take a student’s vitals.)

#healthasright #CHHR