Conference Addresses Environmental Health Equity

Taking place at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, the event brought some 200 UB students, researchers, activists and community members together to explore the theme of “Building an Environmentally Just Community” within Buffalo and beyond.

The day-long conference, which featured guest speakers, breakout sessions and panel discussions, has become a fixture for spurring action and ideas to address and understand persistent race-based disparities and health inequities.

“These [inequities] are a direct result of social determinants of health,” says Timothy F. Murphy, MD, SUNY Distinguished Professor of medicine, conference organizer, and director of UB’s Community Health Equity Research Institute and the Clinical and Translational Science Institute. “We’re here to brainstorm about root causes and about innovative solutions that we can implement to eliminate these inequities that exist in our community.”

While welcoming attendees, Allison Brashear, MD, MBA, UB’s vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School, emphasized that “health equity is really the cornerstone of what we do here in the Jacobs School.” She noted the Jacobs School’s continued focus on health equity in Western New York through education and research. She also highlighted several new departmental chairs and their research on health inequities, disparities in genetic risk factors for disease, and other areas.

Some progress has been realized, says the Rev. George Nicholas, CEO of the Buffalo Center for Health Equity. Ten years ago, terms like “health equity” and “social determinants of health” were less used and understood. “Now, it’s pretty common that you hear people having conversations about health equity and the social determinants of health. We have people being able to look at health statistics and not blaming the people who are the ones that are suffering the most,” he says.

But in terms of environmental health, there’s more to do. Nicholas cited a Stanford University study. “The conclusion was that race is the most significant predictor of a person living near contaminated air, water or soil,” he says. “The long-term health ramifications of these toxic exposures are dire.” Environmental toxins have been linked to reduced academic performance, maternal health complications and many other adverse effects.

To take on health disparities, Nicholas stressed the need for community involvement and collaboration with existing organizations and the importance of directing government spending toward health equity matters. “We have to address the root causes,” he says.

Experiences early in life can shape realizations about health equity.  

While growing up in Brooklyn, Kizzy Charles-Guzman interned with a local botanical garden. She fondly remembers planting tulips and tending gardens amid the sprawling “beautiful urban oasis.” But entering this oasis meant buying a ticket, which was cost-prohibitive for some. “That’s when I was exposed, at that very early age, to what it meant for environmental resources to be gated.”  

Charles-Guzman is now CEO of the Center for Environmental Health, an Oakland, Calif., nonprofit seeking to protect public health through science-based approaches. She delivered the conference’s keynote address, “Our Healthy Futures: Women’s Health Equity, Toxics in Our Environment and How We Can Take Action.”

Too many people have considered environmental toxins as just part of life, she says. “I often think back to my neighborhood growing up and how unaware we were of the invisible dangers around us,” she says, recalling diesel exposure leading to asthma and lead and pesticides complicating cardiovascular disease.

This upbringing helped drive her career in public policy and efforts to combat harms from toxins like lead, plastics and PFAS — “forever” chemicals found in numerous consumer products that persist in the body and environment.  

Charles-Guzman cited research from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine stating that 98 percent of people in the U.S. have PFAS in their blood. “The mobility and presence of forever chemicals in both our environment and in our bodies makes them a long-term health concern globally.”

Women, particularly women of color, bear a heavier burden, she says, because of the products marketed toward them and their often more limited access to health care. Products like faux leather handbags and accessories can also contain lead. And further, she says, low-cost retailers carrying such goods tend to be located in lower income neighborhoods. 

Charles-Guzman emphasized the economic implications of health inequities. “A healthy population is the thing that’s going to drive a healthy economy,” she says. And while watchdog organizations like hers can prosecute manufacturers, there’s real power in collective action and involvement at the community level, she says. “Together, we’re going to stop the flow of invisible harms into our air, water, soil and bodies.”  

The conference also included breakout sessions that detailed environmental jobs for young people; housing and health outcomes; community impact and leaders; urban agriculture and policy; and maternal health and the environment.

Triniti Fitts, a first-year Jacobs School medical student, says she attended Igniting Hope to learn more about getting involved with the people and work focused on health equity. “The main question is, how can we make change? Where can I get involved to be a part of that change? This was that initial step to discovering what’s available in the city of Buffalo,” she says.

The Igniting Hope conference is sponsored by the Jacobs School, the Community Health Equity Research Institute, and the Clinical and Translational Science Institute. Community sponsors include the Buffalo Center for Health Equity and the Office of Health Equity of the Erie County Department of Health, among others.

In addition to the Jacobs School, speakers and participants came from UB’s College of Arts and Sciences, School of Architecture and Planning, and School of Public Health and Health Professions. Numerous leaders and organizers from local nonprofits and community groups also participated.