By Tatiana Sanchez, San Francisco Chronicle, August 24, 2020 Elaine Shelly has lived with multiple sclerosis for 30 years. But she said she still panics whenever she has to see a new neurologist because of racial discrimination she’s experienced in the past. Even getting a proper diagnosis for her illness was a battle. “I’d go to these neurologists who would tell me that Black people don’t get M.S. and that I must be mentally ill,” said Shelly, 63, of San Leandro. A former print journalist,...

It’s been all over the news for months: Black women in the United States are dying from complications during their pregnancies or in childbirth at alarming rates, and those deaths are preventable. Less well explored is how systemic racism and historical trauma have been at the core of what’s driven up these rates over several decades. A March 20 conference entitled The Impact of ACEs on Black Maternal Health took an in-depth look into why Black maternal mortality and complications during...