The Ford Foundation
On the sidelines of the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), and following the presentation of Dr. Tlaleng Mofokeng’s report, Racism and the Right to Health, to UNGA, the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law at Georgetown University will be announcing a new O’Neill-Lancet Commission on Racism, Structural Discrimination and Global Health. This three-year Commission will bring together experts from across the globe to uncover and promote anti-racist strategies and actions to reduce barriers to health and wellbeing facing communities on the basis of race, ethnicity, tribe, caste, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, disability, or religion.
We invite you to join us Friday, October 21, 2022 from 9:00 – 10:30 AM EST for an event on diagnosing the problem of racism in global health, including:
- Catherine Burns, Associate Professor of Medical History, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa
- Ngozi Erondu, Senior Scholar, O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law
- Derek Griffith, Founding Co-Director, Georgetown Racial Justice Institute
- Richard Horton, Editor-in-chief, The Lancet
- Tlaleng Mofokeng, Commission Co-Chair; UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health
- Kumanan Rasanathan, Unit Head, Equity and Health, World Health Organization (WHO)
- Attiya Waris, UN Independent Expert on foreign debt, other international financial obligations and human rights; and Professor of Fiscal Law and Policy
- Chamindra Weerawardhana, writer, political and international affairs analyst and human rights activist
- David Williams, Florence Sprague Norman and Laura Smart Norman Professor of Public Health, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
The concept of the Commission is founded on the recognition that racism, rather than race, creates and maintains unjust and avoidable health inequities in countries around the world. Racial and ethnic disparities in health outcomes are increasingly recognized worldwide. The Commission starts from the premise that racism is a transnational phenomenon that requires global solutions, both inside and outside the health sector. While national racism has been researched in some countries, racism as a driver of health inequities is not sufficiently understood and addressed as a phenomenon that spans borders.
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Related Projects
The O’Neill-Lancet Commission on Racism, Structural Discrimination and Global Health