Listen Again | 55: Ready to Vote?
Voting and Health. It’s not a pairing that readily springs to mind, but increasingly, research and data demonstrate how this dynamic duo impact and amplify one another and dramatically shape community and individual health and access to care. On a daily basis, in every healthcare setting, health teams see the unhappy faces and stressful circumstances of failing health policies and the direct connection between voter access and the critical path to improving our health policies, reducing health inequities, and building healthier and representative democracies. With ballot measures and elections taking place throughout the country, we’re resharing this important conversation as part of the Civic Health Month and the nationwide effort to expand and normalize healthcare settings as community touchpoints for voter access and engagement and learning from the experiences and insights of three civic health innovators Nurse Elizabeth Cohn, Physician Alister Martin, and Community Organizer Aliya Bhatia who provide compelling evidence and data for why health is always on the ballot, and healthcare settings and healthcare professionals are particularly effective messengers and catalysts for voter engagement. Together, they have collectively created and built NursesWhoVote, Democracy at Discharge, Vot-ER, and the Healthy Democracy Kit and are key members of the Civic Health Conference.
