Six of our MCH students attended the 2020 annual meeting of the American Public Health Association(APHA), held October 24-28, 2020, online. What follows is a post from one of the attendees.
Tiwani Oseni, BS
Did I think I’d be attending my first APHA Annual Conference from the comfort of my own home? No. Did I still enjoy the insightful sessions, competitive bingo games, and inspiring film festival? YES!
This year I was given the opportunity to attend my first APHA Conference. The thought of being able to immerse myself into the world of public health was enjoyable but seemed impossible due to the amount of sessions that covered various compelling topics. Luckily, APHA has given every attendee almost a year to re-watch sessions and/or watch sessions that we missed in real time!
Although I left every session feeling educated and inspired, the session “Stay Woke and Take Action: Dismantling Racism As Public Health Professionals” is the session that resonated with me the most. This session and its panelists focused on the importance of health equity and its role in dismantling racism. This session felt raw and allowed me to see how even I (a black woman) can be a better advocate for quality access to healthcare especially for underserved populations including American Indians. Panelist Michael E. Bird MSW,MPH from the Urban Indian Health Commission was able to shine a light on the inquiries, mortality and morbidity rates, and broken treaties that negatively impact Native Americans’ health outcome until this day. This sparked a new research interest in myself and has caused me to go on a deep dive to find necessary statistics on health outcomes and disparities in these communities.
This annual meeting had a recurring theme of advocacy but also reminded me that the fight for health equity cannot and does not stop there. Like Dr. Patrice Harris mentioned in the closing session, “We have to connect the dots between racism, hate crimes, police violence, and health”
Tiwani Oseni, BS is a first year MPH student concentrating in Health Education & Communications and earning a certificate in Maternal and Child Health. She plans to graduate in May 2022. Her interests include health promotion, community health, and maternal mortality in African American communities.
