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San Francisco Department of Public Health
Program on Health Equity and Sustainability SFDPH Screening of Unnatural Causes
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Did you know... • The U.S. spends more per capita on health than any other industrialized country. Yet American life expectancy ranks 30th in the world. • Children living in poverty are 6 times more likely to have poor health than children living in middle or high-income households. • Non-elderly adults who are poor are 7 times more likely to be unable to work due to a health problem, compared with those who are not low-income. • White infants born to women who did not complete high school are 80% more likely to die before their first birthday than those born to women with a college degree. • BUT, babies born to Black women with a college degree are more likely to die before their first birthday than those born to white women who dropped out of high school. |
2008 Film: Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick? March-April 2008This new 4-hour series asks this question: The U.S. is one of the richest countries on the planet. Yet, we rank 29th in the world for life expectancy, among the worst in the industrialized world. What’s happening to our health? Visit the Unnatural Causes website to download segments of the film and view many other resources. Attend an upcoming screening in San Francisco Get Involved in SF Screenings!
Download individual sections of the resource guide: Overview of Unnatural Causes Film Series including
links to Public Impact Campaign materials and resources How does the US rank in Health Olympics? 10 Things to Know About Health Fact Sheet Sample Questions to Help Reframe the Health Equity Debate Health and Land Use: What the Research Says Health and Place in San Francisco - Neighborhood-Level Data and Maps Additional Resources
Or, download the complete guide! The San Francisco Department of Public Health (SFDPH) is organizing a series of events during Spring and Summer 2008 to screen Unnatural Causes. These events will include two town hall meetings, a series of brown bag lunch seminars at the Health Education Training Center, and monthly planning meetings to support other organizations screening the film to their staff or members. These events complemented the PBS screenings in March and April on on KQED, Channel 9. A number of other city agencies and other organizations around the Bay Area will also be screening segments of the film throughout 2008. The events highlight work by city agencies, community organizations, local residents and other stakeholders to improve access to housing, transportation, jobs, childcare, schools, and other basic needs. Following the screenings, SFDPH will facilitate participant discussion and networking, and host visual displays to further describe local struggles and victories related to social determinants of health. Click here to see materials from the January 30th Unnatural Causes Screening and Town Hall Meeting on Land Use and Health. These events are held as part of a national Public Impact Campaign, designed to utilize the series and accompanying tools to introduce equity and social justice into discussion of health and conversely, inject health consequences into debates over social and economic policies. The San Francisco Unnatural Causes Town Hall Meetings are two of over one hundred town hall meetings convened at public health departments across the country through the National Association of County and City Health Officers (NACCHO). If you or your organization want to get involved with SFDPH/local SF screenings, please email Megan.Gaydos@sfdph.org or call 415-252-3919. For more information about Unnatural Causes and the Public Impact Campaign, please visit: www.unnaturalcauses.org About the FilmUnnatural Causes is a seven-part series for PBS broadcast and DVD release designed to sound the alarm about our glaring socio-economic and racial disparities in health--and the need to seek out root causes. While we pour more and more money into drugs, dietary supplements and new medical technologies, it turns out there is much more to our health than bad habits, health care or unlucky genes. The social conditions in which we are born, live and work profoundly affect our well-being and longevity. Conceived as part of an ambitious public education campaign conducted in partnership with leading public health, policy, and community-based organizations, Unnatural Causes will help foster a new and hopeful approach to the public's health. As Harvard epidemiologist David Williams points out, investing in our schools, improving housing, integrating neighborhoods, better jobs and wages, giving people more control over their work, these are as much health strategies as smoking diet and exercise. And these are the stories Unnatural Causes will tell. SERIES STRUCTUREThe series is a medical detective story out to solve the mystery of what’s stalking and killing us before our time, especially those of us who are less well off and darker skinned. The centerpiece of the series is an hour-long opening episode that sets up the overarching themes of the series: health and longevity are correlated with socioeconomic status, people of color face an additional burden and solutions lie not in more pills or better genes, but in better social policies. The main hour is supported by six additional half-hour stories set in different racial and ethnic communities. Each deepens our understanding of the root causes of disease, illuminates pathways by which social conditions affect physiology, and brings viewers face to face with innovative initiatives for health equity. Program One: Sick of It? (wt) - 55 minutesWhy do some of us get sicker and die sooner? What are the connections between healthy bodies, healthy bank accounts and skin color? We travel to Louisville, Kentucky to discover how social policy, growing economic inequality and racism affects our health. Program Two: Place Matters (wt) - 26 minutesOur street address can be a powerful predictor of our health. In Richmond, California we witness how one neighborhood exposes its residents to health threats while in Seattle, Washington, another neighborhood is being created that promotes health. What public policies and community actions make the difference? Program Three: Is America Making Us Sick? (wt) - 26 minutesOn average, poor immigrants of color actually arrive in the U.S. healthier than the average American. But the longer they are here, the less healthy they become. We follow Mexican immigrants laboring on the mushroom farms of Pennsylvania to find out why they are healthier, what's grinding down their health over time (and even more so, that of their children), and what they are doing to reverse this trend. Program Four: When the Bough Breaks (wt) - 26 minutesAfrican American pre-term births and infant mortality rates remain more than twice the national average. The babies of African American women with professional degress face as much risk as being born early and low-birthweight than white high school drop-outs. Might the cumulative impact of racism over the life-course be the culprit? Program Five: Bad Sugar (wt) - 26 minutesDiabetes is a growing American epidemic and Native Americans were the first to suffer its profound effects. We travel to the O'odham Indian reservations of southern Arizona to see how history and powerlessness can drive the disease, while Native efforts to regain control of their communties' economic destiny and re-connect to their culture offer hope for the future. Program Six: Not Just a Paycheck (wt) - 26 minutesUnemployment and job insecurity isn’t just bad for your pocketbook – it’s bad for your health. Must it be this way? Workers in Michigan and Sweden were both thrown out of work by the same corporate giant. One town struggles against depression, spousal abuse and an uptick in heart disease and diabetes while the other seems to be doing just fine. Program Seven: Specks on a Map (wt) - 26 minutesPacific Islanders, even native Hawaiians, have poor health outcomes. In the Marshall Islands and in the unlikely spot of Springdale, Arkansas we can see how U.S. occupation, foreign policy and globalization impact peoples' health--often in unanticipated ways. For more information about Unnatural Causes and the Public Impact Campaign, please visit: www.unnaturalcauses.org About SFDPH EventsIf you are interested in helping organize, co-host, or participate in any of the upcoming SFDPH events, please contact Megan Gaydos via email: Megan.Gaydos@sfdph.org or by phone: (415)252-3919.Links to Relevant SFDPH Programs:African American Health Initiative Community Health Promotion & Prevention Healthy Development Measurement Tool Healthy San Francisco- Our Health Access Program healthysf: Determinants of Health Program on Health, Equity, and Sustainability San Francisco Department of Public Health, Homepage
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