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Americans were already struggling with historic levels of mental health problems amid the coronavirus pandemic. Then came the video of George Floyd’s death at the hands of police. Within a week, anxiety and depression among African Americans shot to higher rates than experienced by any other racial or ethnic group, with 41 percent screening positive for at least one of those symptoms, data from the Census Bureau shows. The findings — from a survey launched by the federal government...

The founder's voice from Arizona Trauma Informed Faith Community (AZTIFC) on racism and trauma informed care movement

Members of the 1199SEIU union, the nation’s largest healthcare workers’ union, kneel for eight minutes and 46 seconds, during a vigil. Photograph: Mike Segar/Reuters Long before a white police officer killed George Floyd and sparked nationwide outrage, long before Covid-19 began killing Black people at twice the rate of their white counterparts, doctors and health experts were raising alarms that systematic racism is itself a pervasive, deadly pandemic – one that kills both instantaneously...

By W. Ryan Powell, William R. Buckingham, Jamie L. Larson, et al., JAMA Network Open, June 11, 2020 Key Points Question Can neighborhood disadvantage, a social determinant of health, be incorporated into existing brain bank data to evaluate the risk of biological outcomes, such as Alzheimer disease neuropathology? Findings In this cross-sectional study using autopsy samples from 447 decedents, living in a disadvantaged neighborhood at the time of death was associated with an increased risk...

From The California Endowment, June 2020 Pain. Grief. Rage. Outrage. Frustration. Hurt. Ironically, at around the time that George Floyd pleaded for air while a police officer’s knee was lodged into his neck, our Board of Directors was scheduled to have visited the Equal Justice Museum and the Lynching Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama – a trip postponed by the Covid-19 pandemic. The Lynching exhibit was thoughtfully constructed as a powerful reminder of America’s terrible past and history of...

By Stephanie Stephens, California Healthline, June 10, 2020 Dr. Christopher Travis, an intern in obstetrics-gynecology, has cared for patients with COVID-19 and performed surgery on women suspected of having the coronavirus. But the patient who arrived for a routine prenatal visit in two masks and gloves had a problem that wasn’t physiological. “She told me, ‘I’m terrified I’m going to get this virus that’s spreading all over the world,'” and worried it would hurt her baby, he said of the...

With the new coronavirus, COVID-19, engulfing the world, Gwyneth Paltrow decided to go to a health expert when she was asked to be on the cover of SHAPE magazine’s July/August cover . Rather than focusing on her own life, Paltrow interviewed Dr. Nadine Burke Harris , the first surgeon general of California, about the state of health today. Their conversation happened in April — before George Floyd's death in police custody led to mass protests over racial injustice across the country, and...

Transforming Trauma Episode 015: Post-Traumatic Growth in Communities of Color and NARM in the Classroom with Giancarlo Simpson Transforming Trauma host Sarah Buino and guest Giancarlo A. Simpson, MS, reconnect in the wake of George Floyd’s death and the nationwide protests against racial violence and systemic oppression, providing real-time context to their previously-recorded conversation about NARM’s ability to address complex trauma and support post-traumatic growth in communities of...

By The Staffs fo Kaiser Health News and The Guardian, California Healthline, June 12, 2020 America’s health care workers are dying. In some states, medical personnel account for as many as 20% of known coronavirus cases. They tend to patients in hospitals, treating them, serving them food and cleaning their rooms. Others at risk work in nursing homes or are employed as home health aides. “Lost on the Frontline,” a collaboration between KHN and The Guardian, has identified 635 such workers...

Hosting a robust lineup of speakers including Stacey Abrams , David Byrne , Madeleine Albright , and Anthony Fauci to name a few, the Festival will be free and all online for the first time in its 16-year history. Tune in daily , June 28 - July 2, on our website. Programming will address events shaping our world today, including the Covid-19 pandemic and ongoing protests against systemic racism. We will look to what may lay ahead in the future, including opportunities for economic recovery,...

By Sandro Galea and Salma M. Abdalla, JAMA Network, June 12, 2020 More than 110 000 people have died in the US because of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, a pathogen that was unknown just 6 months ago. Ubiquitous fear and anxiety that accompanied the emergence of the new coronavirus led to widespread limits on physical contact in attempts to mitigate the spread of the virus. That in turn brought the US economy to a halt, resulting in more than 40 million people filing for...

By Michael Burke, EdSource, June 11, 2020 A movement to reform California public school policing and drastically rethink school safety is quickly gaining momentum amid nationwide protests against police brutality following the killing of George Floyd. In Los Angeles, Oakland, Sacramento and San Francisco, administrators and school boards are under pressure from community groups who are renewing demands for police-free schools and calling on districts to instead hire more counselors and other...