“Unnatural Causes” Kick-Off Event

The Health Equity Alliance of Tallahassee (HEAT) is teaming up with WFSU, the Public Broadcast Station, to begin a series of scheduled community screenings of the PBS documentary Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick? This four-part series goes beyond popular conceptions linking health to medical care, lifestyles, and genes to explore evidence of other, more powerful determinants: the social conditions in which we are born, live, and work. The first episode will air Sunday, January 10, 2010 at 3:00 pm.

To jumpstart the community film screenings, we are inviting key stakeholders to the Unnatural Causes kick-off event at the studios of WFSU-TV at 6:00 p.m., Friday, January 8th, 2010 (see flyer). The event will be an evening of collaboration to address the health inequities that keep many American residents from living a long and healthy life. We invite you to help bridge this gap by building a shared understanding and language around the root causes of health inequities in Tallahassee and surrounding areas. The event will provide a preview of episode one of Unnatural Causes and we will hear from panel participants as we examine how the overarching themes of the film relate to our community.

For more information, contact Miaisha Mitchell, Executive Director of the Greater Frenchtown Governor’s Revitalization Council at 850-224-8404 or email her at mmiaisha@aol.com.

Update, 1/6/10: The agenda for the Kickoff Event on Friday, Jan. 8, is now available here (PDF).

Next HEAT meeting is February 16

The Health Equity Alliance of Tallahassee (HEAT) will hold its next meeting on Tuesday, February 16, at 6:00 – 8:00 p.m. We are evaluating whether our usual meeting space at TMH will be available. The key goal for the February meeting will be to reflect on events we are organizing around the local re-broadcast of Unnatural Causes in January and to discuss our next steps for building on these events. We also anticipate updates from the Food Environment and HEAT-BP Steering Committees and discussion of new funding opportunities for community capacity building.

Mark you calendars now and stay tuned for further announcements about the meeting location.