This page includes documentaries, articles and other sources of information relevant to the health and wellness of African American families and communities.
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Recent AABC News
Support for AABC’s Proposed Bill: HF 1268
AABC recently received the personal support from Dr. Thomas Kottke, MD, MSPH of HealthPartners on its budgetary proposal HF 1268 that was introduced to the Minnesota legislature on this past Thursday, February 18th, 2021. Dr. Kottke cited his and others’ 2019 research showing the health disparities of Medicaid members “suffer more than do those who are insured by a commercial product or Medicare” specifically as it relates to diagnoses of anxiety and depression among those members.
HF 1268 titled “Supporting Healthy Development of Babies During Pregnancy and Postpartum” requests $260,000 in both fiscal years 2022 and 2023 to be appropriated directly to Wilder AABC for community based training and education on best practices for supporting healthy development of babies during pregnancy and postpartum — specifically serving families who are black, indigenous or people of color.
Sameerah Bilal-Roby, Director of AABC, will be testifying on the importance of this bill and its positive impacts if passed on Tuesday, February 23rd, 2021. Track the progress of HF 1268 on the Office of the Revisor of Statutes here.
Dr. Kottke is a cardiologist, epidemiologist and the medical director for well-being for the health plan at HealthPartners and a professor at the University of Minnesota Department of Medicine. You can read Dr. Kottke’s personal letter of support here.
Funder invests in AABC’s Health Equity and Training on Social Determinants Equality for Black Families
African American Babies Coalition and Projects and the Cultural Wellness Center as the 501(c)(3) partner wants to thank Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota Foundation for selecting us for the grant which helped map out transformative project initiatives. Our goal was to enhance community work which speaks to equity and equality for families. The end game was to continually have a road-map which aides our stakeholders to view authentic partnership with Black, Brown and Indigenous communities addressing health and progress as an urgent obligation. The grant has provided us the capacity to address the cracks in the foundation where many of our love ones descend undetected, feeling useless and often adapting to self-destruction. We encountered some difficulties building a charter for a national organization, showing only to come out at the other end with constructive accomplishments to be a distinguished guide for future work.
Check out our Fall 2020 Newsletter!
Additional Resources
When Racism Literally Makes You Sick: University of Minnesota Alumni Association
Maternal and Child Health “Did You Know” Series: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention