Healthy Communities Conversation on Health Equity: Summary

This is a summary of the conversations facilitated by Centre for Healthy Communities on June 17, 2021. The Healthy Communities Conversation focused on ‘Health equity – what does this mean to you?’

Key Highlights: 

• The concept of social and health inequities can often be complex, vary greatly from one person to another, and is recognized to be influenced by multiple dimensions.
  • It is important to first inquire and understand the barriers that people face. Then, we should apply social-culturally appropriate language and adjust the messages for varied reading levels to better answer questions people may have.
  • Public health is not about convincing people about vaccine uptake. Public health is about engaging with the people and communities to understand and address the barriers that may exist.
• To systematically reduce social and health inequities, we first need to recognize that they exist within many systems. It is not a siloed issue. It is also critical for everyone to work together to draw attention to inequities and incorporate them into every conversation.
• To promote equity, it is important to carefully consider individuals, groups, and communities that: want to be in the room; are invited to the decision-making table; feel safe and welcomed to join the conversation; face barriers in getting to the table; are under-represented; and are impacted by decisions.
  • The ability to make a decision is often associated with equity and power and, therefore, we should consider who is impacted by the decision-making, who is making the decisions, and whether the individuals in power are representative of everyone with lived experiences.
  • We should approach people, groups, and communities first and meaningfully engage them in the discussion of solutions.
  • We should take appropriate actions to change scenarios of non-diverse groups making decisions for a diverse group of people.
  • We should move beyond discussing the inequities and address the core issues, by implementing meaningful actions to bring about change.
• When thinking about setting and place, it is important to recognize and tackle many differences between urban and rural context, like education, knowledge, health, and wellness.
• Moving forward, we should consider: working with people and communities to build and maintain trust; establish sustainable relationships and systems; and adopt a systematic health equity approach that is more responsive to the diversity of needs that exist in our communities, workplaces, and many other settings.

Additional examples to consider when thinking about equity

• History and Trust in Canada:
  • A long, generational history of mistrust in political environments and health services exist in underserved communities.
  • Actions from the past have lingering consequences.
  • Communication and messaging must be managed appropriately as it has the potential to create fear, anxiety, and confusion within the public.
• Edmonton River Valley – Ribbon of Green:
  • Consider who was not at the engagement table.