Healthy Communities News

Workforce training that takes a single mom of five from homeless to hopeful in Cleveland. Students debating how to go tobacco-free on a Philadelphia campus. These are two of the exciting stories we’ve covered this past year on our Healthy Communities News podcast. And now you can sample them all on our year-end episode. Whether it’s been about faith leaders joining forces with their congregants to shed weight, or a former sex worker who draws upon her own hard-earned experience with opioids to help others struggling with addiction and recovery, we’ve gone around the country to shine a light on people and programs who are bringing change to their communities. We hope they will inspire you, and we look forward to bringing you more stories of hope this coming year.

In Nashville, Tennessee, there’s a low-slung brick building nestled among fast food shops and a gas station on Clarksville Pike. It’s proudly painted red, white, and blue – a comfortable, well-worn spot that’s become a cultural hub for generations of African-American customers. And now, patrons of the barbershop can get more than a shave and a haircut. High rates of hypertension in this community are compounded by the fact that African-American men often aren’t receiving regular medical care. A group of partners, including Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Nashville Health, and CVS Health, are setting out to address this by placing pharmacists inside barbershops to screen for high blood pressure and recommend necessary treatments.

Medical services are only part of staying healthy. Your community plays an even larger role: whether you have access to safe streets and fresh food, whether you can breathe clean air and drink untainted water, whether you can find places to exercise and socialize. These “social determinants of health” are critical to the well-being of communities and their residents. However, getting them right can be a real challenging. Hear from the places and people who are making a difference.

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Carrie Robinson is a 28-year-old single mom living outside of Cleveland, Ohio. She’s a pharmacy technician – but not too long ago, she and her five kids found themselves homeless. She shared her story about how CVS Health’s Workforce Innovation and Talent Center changed her life. The centers provide people in under served communities with the training, resources and support network they need to be successful. Like Carrie.

Gina is an individual in recovery from opioid use disorder and a former sex worker. Today, she’s a Linkage to Care Coordinator in rural North Carolina, a job funded by an Aetna Foundation grant. Each day, Gina uses her street smarts and lively personality to connect residents struggling with opioid use disorder with the help and resources they need.

Faith leaders, county health officials, the local health system and community groups have proven that it takes a village to address local health issues. The Village HeartBEAT program created a fitness challenge in local congregations. The goal? To help residents battling heart disease and diabetes. The program uses exercise, nutrition and community gardens to help raise the spirits and lower the weight of participants.

Small businesses can revitalize neighborhoods – so the Bridgeport OIC is lending a hand to local entrepreneurs. We talk to Jeff Nelson of Seeding Knowledge, a start-up that plants and maintains gardens and sells produce. He’s expanding his services to the East End Pop Up Market, where he’ll offer not only fruits and vegetables, but cooking classes and gardening instruction.

As the economy struggles and poverty rises in Bridgeport, manufacturing jobs are not the only thing leaving town: Residents have had to go farther and farther to find fresh food. But a group of local businesspeople is looking to reverse that trend. They’re opening the new East End Pop Up Market, which will offer not only fresh food, but also job training and wellness workshops. It’s a solution that can be a model for food deserts across the country.