CHC Health Equity Guide Home
At the Center for Health Communication, we are dedicated to infusing a health equity paradigm throughout all levels of our work.
According to the CDC:
Health equity is the state in which everyone has a fair and just opportunity to attain their highest level of health. Achieving this requires ongoing societal efforts to:
- Address historical and contemporary injustices;
- Overcome economic, social, and other obstacles to health and health care; and
- Eliminate preventable health disparities. [1,2]
To achieve health equity, we must change the systems and policies that have resulted in the generational injustices that give rise to racial and ethnic health disparities
At the CHC we believe that health is a universal human right and communication is a powerful tool to promote inclusion, equity, and social justice. We aim for all aspects of our work include a focus on health equity with the goal of effecting individual, organizational, community, structural, and policy change.
At the CHC, we are intentional and know that equity happens by design, not by accident. Therefore, we use audience-centered principles in our work and we:
- Acknowledge social and political determinants of health
- Acknowledge historical and current systems and inequities
- Acknowledge our implicit bias
- Value diversity in all forms
- Value lived experience
- Use person first language
- Avoid stereotypes & stigmatizing language
- Avoid deficit framing
- Promote Universal Design Principles