Redesigning Our Food System To Make Health Accessible For All

May 20, 2022

Karen Washington, a passionate farmer and food advocate, dives into the pressing issue of food apartheid and its impact on health disparities in marginalized communities. She emphasizes the need for transformative changes in our food system, advocating for grassroots movements to empower local growers. The conversation highlights the historical barriers to healthy food access and the importance of reconnecting communities to agriculture. Washington calls for accountability in policy-making and a collective effort to create a more equitable and nourishing food environment for all.

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ADVICE

Empowering Communities

Acknowledge tough choices faced by communities needing support and focus on empowering them.
Question corporate power and create a vision where communities aren't reliant on potentially harmful entities.

ANECDOTE

Hopi Chief and Colonized Food

Dr. Hyman shares an encounter with an overweight Hopi chief with diabetes, whose "traditional" ceremonial foods included unhealthy options like Coke and cake.
This highlights how colonized food systems disrupt traditional diets, leading to health issues.

INSIGHT

Structural Violence and Disease

Dr. Rupa Marya connects chronic disease to structural violence, citing social and environmental factors.
She explains how marginalized groups bear the brunt of inflammatory diseases due to these structural inequities.

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This episode is brought to you by Athletic Greens and Rupa Health.

We are living in an epidemic of chronic disease that is destroying our health, our communities, and our economy. The common denominator between all of these things is food, or more specifically, our food system. The way our food is grown, transported, processed, and consumed is making us sick and driving health disparities related to income and race, especially among marginalized groups.

In today’s episode, I talk with Dr. Marcia Chatelain, Dr. Rupa Marya, Raj Patel, and Karen Washington about creating a society that cultivates health, how our existing social structures predispose us to illness, and how we can make great changes to our food system through grassroots efforts.

Dr. Marcia Chatelain is a professor of history and African American studies at Georgetown University. The author of South Side Girls: Growing up in the Great Migration, she teaches about women’s and girls’ history, as well as black capitalism. Her latest book, Franchise: The Golden Arches in Black America, examines the intricate relationship among African American politicians, civil rights organizations, communities, and the fast food industry.

Dr. Rupa Marya is an associate professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, where she practices and teaches Internal Medicine. Her research examines the health impacts of social systems, from agriculture to policing. She is a cofounder of the Do No Harm Coalition, a collective of health workers committed to addressing disease through structural change.

Raj Patel is a research professor at the University of Texas at Austin’s Lyndon B Johnson School of Public Affairs, a professor in the university’s department of nutrition, and a research associate at Rhodes University, South Africa. He is the author of Stuffed and Starved, the New York Times bestselling The Value of Nothing, and coauthor of A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things.

Karen Washington is a farmer, activist, and food advocate. She is the co-owner and farmer at Rise & Root Farm in Chester, New York. Karen cofounded Black Urban Growers (BUGS), an organization supporting growers in both urban and rural settings. In 2012, Ebony magazine voted her one of the 100 most influential African Americans in the country, and in 2014 Karen was the recipient of the James Beard Leadership Award.

This episode is brought to you by Athletic Greens and Rupa Health.

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Rupa Health is a place where Functional Medicine practitioners can access more than 2,000 specialty lab tests. You can check out a free, live demo with a Q&A or create an account at RupaHealth.com.

Full-length episodes of these interviews can be found here:

Dr. Marcia Chatelain

Dr. Rupa Marya and Raj Patel

Karen Washington