Charmel Apilan '23
Disparities in the NY healthcare system are alive and affecting the lives of several communities. Furthermore, minorities are part of the majority of those who are unable to acquire important resources, such as nutritional benefits and healthcare sources. The reasons behind the inability to obtain these resources are discrimination, racial motivation, and toxicity. This reality within our society is unjust because a lack of nutrition will lead to major illnesses and diseases.
Nutrition is an essential process of obtaining food for our health, growth, and development. It is a necessity with beneficial factors such as improvement to well-being, delays to aging, reduction of illness, and several more attributes. When maintaining a stable nutrition plan, your body increases in tissue and joint quality, mood, and energy. Without balanced and healthy nutrition, your body could develop malnutrition, which causes poor diet, weight loss, and physical and mental disabilities.
New Yorkers in underserved communities have to mostly rely on delis and bodegas for their daily diet. In return, corner grocery stores leave people with less healthy produce, which can factor into malnutrition. Certain types of nutrients are helpful and damaging to your body without the proper balance. In predominantly white neighborhoods, there are more variations of nutritional products to acquire the right nutrients people need to sustain their bodies.
All five boroughs of NY have been affected by this issue for quite some time. Take a look at the map shown. This is a map of NYC, showing all communities with no disparities, moderate disparities, and high disparities. The colors blue, yellow, and red represent the level of disparities in each community. The darker the color is, the higher the number of disparities the community contains. Most of the neighborhoods with high marks of disparities are located in Central Harlem, NYC; East Harlem, NYC; East NY, Brooklyn; Brownsville, Brooklyn; and Jamaica, Queens. The common aspect of these neighborhoods is that these are communities of minorities.
These statistics are valuable because we, as citizens of New York City, have the ability to advocate for change in the healthcare system and the food-production franchise. It is important to be aware of these injustices because the ability to be woke is powerful and can improve our future.
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Edited by: Katarina Radulovic '24, Natalia Cseh '23, and Ms. Brilliant
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