The Health Equity Hub addresses the systemic inequalities in healthcare access and outcomes for Black communities. It highlights disparities in life expectancy, maternal health, and chronic disease, while pointing toward health policy reform solutions for a more just healthcare system.
Health Equity Hub: Expanding Access to Healthcare & Ending Black Health Disparities
Tracking policies, data, and solutions to close racial health gaps—maternal mortality, access to care, chronic disease, mental health, and environmental harms.
The Health Equity Hub is about public health justice, exploring the intersection of race, social policy, and healthcare access. For generations, systemic racism has shaped unequal outcomes in health for Black Americans — from higher maternal mortality rates to disproportionate exposure to pandemics like COVID-19.
This Hub curates policy research, case studies, and lived experiences to illuminate barriers and chart solutions toward justice in healthcare.
What We Mean by “Health Equity”
Health equity means that everyone has a fair and just opportunity to be as healthy as possible—removing obstacles like poverty, discrimination, and their consequences (powerlessness, lack of access to good jobs with fair pay, quality education and housing, safe environments, and health care).
“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhuman.”
— Martin Luther King Jr.
For Black Americans, inequities persist across the life course: higher rates of maternal mortality, infant mortality, hypertension, diabetes complications, asthma, and preventable hospitalizations. These gaps are not biological—they’re the result of policy choices.
Focus Areas
- Maternal & Reproductive Health — End the Black maternal mortality crisis and improve perinatal care quality.
- Medicaid & Access to Care — Eligibility, coverage, and provider networks that actually reach people.
- Mental Health & Substance Use — Community-based care, crisis response, and parity.
- Environmental Health & Justice — Air, water, heat, toxins, and neighborhood conditions that drive disease.
Why It Matters Now
- States are reevaluating Medicaid after the public health emergency—millions risk losing coverage through procedural churn.
- Maternal mortality remains dramatically higher for Black women, regardless of income or education.
- Mental health needs rose post-pandemic; access lags and crisis care is uneven.
- Climate and environmental hazards disproportionately burden Black neighborhoods.
How to Use This Hub
- Start with the policy primers (below).
- Read the feature essay: Bridging the Health Equity Gap.
- Follow the latest news in our News Hub and topic categories.
