By Karen Zraick, The New York Times, October 19, 2021
The New York City Board of Health declared racism a public health crisis on Monday, passing a resolution that directed the Health Department to take steps to ensure a “racially just recovery” from the coronavirus pandemic.
The resolution called on the department to work with other agencies to root out systemic racism within policies, plans and budgets on a wide range of matters that affect health, including land use, transportation and education. It also directed the department to improve data-collection practices and examine both the health code and its own history for structural bias.
Dr. Dave A. Chokshi, the department’s commissioner, is also one of the 11 medical experts who sit on its board. At the meeting on Monday, he noted that the board was founded amid epidemics of yellow fever, cholera and smallpox in the early 1800s. Advances in sanitation and understanding the links between environmental factors and health helped curb those diseases.
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