In a time when little feels apolitical, most would agree that every person has a right to achieve optimal health. One pathway to achieve improved health for all is by centering equity in health care delivery.
Monkeypox, a serious but usually non-fatal disease that can cause flu-like symptoms and painful lesions, stems from a virus similar to smallpox that spreads through close physical contact. Contrary to its name, the virus’s natural reservoir is not thought to be primates — rather, the zoonotic disease tends to be carried by rodents, which can then pass the virus to human hosts.
I want to create an environment of care that they may not have in other parts of their lives. Particularly for Black women, I want my clinical climate to be one where they feel like they don’t have to carry the burden of the world on their shoulders and be strong. I want my patients to enter as themselves.
Dr. Kim Sue has dedicated much of her career to highlighting these womens’ stories, researching American social policy for managing national drug use, and illustrating the deleterious impacts of mass incarceration.