Rapid Roundtable ǀ TREC Hosts Conversation Centered on Health Equity and Access in the Texas-Mexico Border Region

On Wednesday, April 6, CHILDREN AT RISK and the Texas Racial Equity Collaborative (TREC) hosted the fifth in a series of monthly roundtables centered on racial equities experienced by Texas children and their families.  Each month, speakers discuss pervasive issues and trends impacting historically marginalized communities, such as how African American and Hispanic communities suffered higher rates of COVID-19 infections and COVID-19 related deaths causing community wide trauma, or how African American and Hispanic children have been the hardest hit by pandemic learning loss.

April’s Racial Equity Rapid Roundtable focused on themes relating to health equity and justice in Texas’ border communities by highlighting the needs, barriers, and best practices surrounding children’s health in the US-Mexico border region. CHILDREN AT RISK Chief Equity Officer and Director of TREC, Sharon Watkins Jones, and Guadalupe Fernández, Director of the Children’s Immigration Network, were joined by Adriana Cadena, Director of Protecting Immigrant Families with the National Immigration Law Center, Daniel Diaz, Director of Organizing with La Union del Pueblo Entero (LUPE), and Hansel O. Ibarra, MPA, Program Director with MHP Salud.

Roundtable participants highlighted partnerships and creative solutions advocates and providers in border communities have implemented to address the unique health issues, and outlined how state and national policymakers can support children’s health and wellbeing in the region.

“Generations of intuitional discrimination and structural racism are directly linked to the inequities in health for children living in the Borderlands that we see today. It is important to center regional voices and invest in community-led solutions in addressing the health disparities on behalf of all children living across our border region,” says Guadalupe Fernández, Director of the Children’s Immigration Network at CHILDREN AT RISK. “Our systems and policies must be rooted in health justice and community care as sustainable remedies to foster healthy and thriving communities.”

Watch the roundtable recording below, or on Facebook at https://fb.watch/cdz6-A12r9/

Roundtable Participants:

• Adriana Cadena – Director of Protecting Immigrant Families, National Immigration Law Center

• Daniel Diaz, Director of Organizing, La Union del Pueblo Entero (LUPE)

• Hansel O. Ibarra, MPA, Program Director, MHP Salud

• Guadalupe Fernández, Director, Children’s Immigration Network, CHILDREN AT RISK

• Sharon Watkins Jones, Chief Equity Officer and Director, Texas Racial Equity Collaborative, CHILDREN AT RISK