iHEA Board Statement
The ruthless killing of George Floyd, and the subsequent ongoing protests across the USA and globally, have highlighted again not only racial inequality in policing and justice systems but also systemic and institutionalized racism in all aspects of society. The legacy of colonialism and slavery remains pervasive. The persistence of racism and its consequences for people of color, despite decades of community action and innumerable government inquiries, is of deep concern.
The global anti-racism protests come at a time when people of color are bearing a disproportionate share of severe illness and death, as well as the dire socio-economic consequences, of the COVID-19 pandemic. This pandemic illustrates well the long-term, structural and systemic health and social wellbeing effects of racism.
iHEA is committed to undertaking concrete actions that will contribute to the changes necessary to promote social justice, diversity and inclusiveness within our association and more broadly. In particular, the iHEA Board has overseen the development of an “Equality, Diversity and Inclusiveness (EDI) Survey” over the past few months. This survey will be launched in the next few weeks and will provide a mechanism for members to identify areas in need of change within the organization and in our activities. This will inform the development of further actions to address discrimination in all its forms, including how to improve representation on our association structures and how to further promote diverse voices in our events and ongoing activities. We are also about to embark on a program for the co-production of health economics curricula with under-represented groups, which will seek to integrate work by varied authors and promote teaching practices that encourage diversity and inclusiveness.
We commit ourselves personally and collectively to actions that will contribute to broader efforts to end racism and other forms of discrimination that end too many lives prematurely and diminish too many futures.
View this statement online here.
