2020 was a daunting year! Between the raging COVID-19 pandemic and the heightened awareness of systemic racial injustice, the U.S. laid bare glaring inequities across healthcare, policing, criminal justice, education, and more. That inequity is painful and continues to take a toll on individuals and communities alike.
So, in 2021, how do you celebrate a Black History Month in a way that is authentic to the challenges we face, while still being honest about the mountains left to climb?
You start.
While Floyd Lee Locums can’t claim to know how to fix a broken justice system or how to distribute societal opportunities more fairly, we do know healthcare. For many of our Black and Brown loved ones and communities of color, the statistics don’t lie. Time and again, lower-quality healthcare is available to People of Color.
This is true of care for COVID-19, as well. Kettering Health Network just released data on Black Americans being vaccinated at a much lower rate than those who are White. In addition, across coronavirus care, the CDC has outlined in detail how every aspect of COVID-19 care up to the potential point of death are mired in inequalities.
The care the CDC outlines isn’t just determined by the healthcare provider or system, either. Even addressing those don’t factor in the disproportionate impact of someone’s neighborhood or physical environment, access to financial income and support, or ability to receive quality education. All of these inadvertently affect the care you get, too.
So, for this Black History Month, and especially beyond, we need to educate our communities and industry on these inequities—and continue to pressure local and state government to make progress on changing systems that repress and underrepresent us.
For Floyd Lee Locums’ part, we are committed to starting (and restarting when we get it wrong). We will continue to listen and speak on topics of equity and inclusion in our DEI&B Council. We will also continue to train our team on equal employment opportunity initiatives and empower them to participate in “We Serve,” our volunteer program that supports organizations like NAACP and the Human Rights Organization.
Further, our diversity, equity and inclusion efforts will include being a community voice and advocate for the International African American Museum being built in Charleston, South Carolina and opening in 2022. This museum is national resource for preserving and sharing African American history—and is being built on the very wharf where slaves were brought over in centuries prior.
For all these advocacy opportunities and more, Floyd Lee Locums will be an ally in what comes next.
Due to the events of 2020 and COVID-19, this is a Black History Month unlike any other. But maybe the years that follow can be unlike any Black History Months that came before for a positive reason. Because we changed, and chose to start.