M3.2- Vulnerable Populations

This TED talk confirmed why I am so passionate about the field of public health. It’s so easy to become overwhelmed by the many issues our environment and the many ways to attack those issues, and at times I start to feel like it is too complicated to fix. But it’s not. Rishi Manchanda encourages us to look “upstream” and look at what may be causing these problems. We know prevention the core value of public health, but this clip reminded me that our environment has a way bigger impact on our health than we realize.  It is easy to blame chronic disease on lifestyle choices, but unfortunately not everyone realizes the lives that low income populations lead are not a choice. They are doing the best they can under the circumstances in which they live, and everyone deserves to have a basic standard of living conditions, because, as Rishi Manchanda reminded us, our zip code matters more than our genetic code.

His anecdote of a woman named Veronica seemed groundbreaking to me, but it really shouldn’t be. She lives in South Central LA, but her story can be translated to many communities facing the same issues of housing, food insecurity, and neighborhood violence. It’s been shown that low income and minority populations live closer to the largest clusters of toxic emissions, but when those areas are the most affordable places to live in, what other choice do they have? I continue to be both saddened and inspired by all of this information.