Webinar Invitation
Tuesday, June 12, 2018 from 3:00-4:00 pm ET
Many indigenous communities are at the forefront of developing and implementing plans to address climate change in their homelands. These plans vary in focus and content, but always remain rooted in the geography of the community’s homelands, making each plan unique.
One aspect of climate change planning that has been difficult to capture is potential impacts to indigenous health. The difficulty arises because mainstream evaluation methods focus primarily on physiological health, such as increased heat stroke or vector-borne diseases, while many indigenous communities see health as much more – such as complex relationships between humans, non-human beings, and the natural and spiritual worlds. These broader definitions of health do not fit in mainstream public health evaluation methods.
The Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, a Coast Salish Community in the Pacific Northwest, will discuss how they determined and evaluated projected public health impacts by tailoring the CDC’s “Building Resilience Against Climate Effects” (BRACE) public health framework to better fit Swinomish health priorities. Swinomish staff Dr. Jamie Donatuto will present an overview of the Swinomish Indigenous Health Indicators—aspects of health not seen in mainstream assessments—and how to evaluate them for use in climate change evaluations and planning. Results from the Swinomish project will be shared as well as next steps. Dr. Donatuto will discuss how the BRACE framework can be tailored by other indigenous communities seeking to determine and evaluate their own unique aspects of health.
