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True freedom means having the freedom to live a life where your health is not determined by the color of your skin, how you identify, or where you live. Yet for millions of people in the United States, health remains elusive, enjoyed as a privilege by the few rather than a basic human right by all.

Health disparities are often the result of institutionalized discrimination. This takes the form of a doctor who takes a Black person’s pain symptoms less seriously, or a health clinic staffed by providers lacking training on how to appropriately care for a transgender person.

It manifests in a hospital system that breaks ground only in a predominantly white neighborhood, leaving the nearby Latino community with limited access to essential health services, and in a public health department that fails to translate pamphlets critical for disease prevention into Chinese or Arabic, despite a need in the community.

In Pete’s administration, combating institutionalized discrimination and structural racism in health care will be a priority. This begins by ensuring that achieving health equity is a strategic, national effort. In his first 100 days, Pete will direct the federal government to develop a National Health Equity Strategy. He will also designate and invest in Health Equity Zones, a new way to empower communities to combat their most pressing disparities.

Pete will make achieving health equity a national priority, through these major changes:

I. Make Achieving Health Equity a National Priority. Leadership must come from the highest levels of government. In addition to a National Health Equity Strategy, Pete will appoint a Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) committed to achieving health equity and revitalize the Office of Civil Rights in HHS to ensure that legal frameworks are in place to challenge health inequities. And by designating and investing in Health Equity Zones (HEZs), he will empower communities to address their most pressing health disparities.

II. Reorient Our Health and Public Health Systems Towards Prioritizing Health Equity. Pete will transform our health and public health systems not towards neutrality, but towards anti-racism, -misogyny, -homophobia, -ableism, and -xenophobia. He will empower public health departments to become Chief Health Strategists in their communities. He will invest in training our health workforce to combat racism and bias when treating patients, and address the exclusion of underrepresented groups in the health workforce. Pete’s plan will also focus on investing in finding cures for diseases that disproportionately affect minority populations. This includes research on cures for HIV, triple negative breast cancer, and sickle cell disease.

III. Combat Health Inequity By Adopting a “Health in All Policies” Approach. Pete understands that most of our health outcomes are determined by what happens outside a clinic or hospital: by where we can live, what we can eat, and what jobs we have access to. For these reasons, Pete strongly believes that a health equity lens must be applied across federal policies and programs. That’s why he will establish Offices of Health Equity and Justice within relevant federal agencies, and entrust them with carrying out the federal government's National Health Equity Strategy.

These policies, which only represent a fraction of Pete’s platform, will help drastically reduce health disparities across the country. We hope you’ll read Pete’s plan for health equity in full by clicking here. [[link removed]]

Thank you,

Pete for America Policy Team



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