Have you ever thought about how the place where you live can shape your health outcomes, opportunities, and perceptions? I grew up in a predominantly Hispanic/Latino neighborhood near Los Angeles. My experience as a Latina is unique, but the narrative in my neighborhood is not representative of Latinos in other parts of the country, like the Texas Rio Grande Valley (RGV) for example.
As public health professionals, we often inform our interventions on the social determinants of health and how behavioral factors deeply influence health outcomes. However, it is important to keep in mind that behavior is, in large part, determined by the socioeconomic, cultural, and environmental conditions in which individuals live.
In less than 24 hours, I’ll be home again, but this time it won’t be to visit my loved ones or stay in my old bedroom. Instead, I’ll be returning to the valley through my Public Health in Action course.
Every culture is significantly different in terms of what they eat, how they prepare their food, how often they exercise and more! It is not appropriate to disregard these important aspects of another culture when trying to implement various interventions.
As humans, we tend to revert to our own life experiences as indicators of how we should respond to certain situations. While I wait for these next few days to pass, I cannot help but wonder how this will all play out.
Today I'd like to share some thoughts about forgotten people. The concept was first introduced to me as a child with the faces on milk cartons and newspapers of missing children who had been missing for 20 plus years but still had advertisements out for them. It was so easy to think, "nope haven't seen 'em," flip the page, recycle, and forget.