Mutual Aid as a Community Health Strategy

Presenter: Alexia Distasio

Faculty Sponsor: Deborah Keisch

School: UMass Amherst

Research Area: Public Policy

Session: Poster Session 1, 10:30 AM - 11:15 AM, Auditorium, A20

ABSTRACT

Healthcare accessibility is not only defined by the availability of medical services within a community, but by its affordability and by the larger structural determinants that all come together to influence how, if and when a family or individual can receive healthcare. Disparities driven by under-resourced systems, socioeconomic inequalities, and unsupportive policies continuously widen the gap for marginalized communities to access proper healthcare. In acknowledgment of these inequalities, many communities around the United States are choosing to participate in mutual aid models that can act as alternative, grassroots strategies to work towards individuals gaining access to the healthcare systems they deserve when they are being declined from the formal care system. In this presentation, I will present an examination of mutual aid efforts, such as time banks, to demonstrate that a community driven framework has the potential to aid in addressing these disparities. Through working with the UMass Mutual Aid Project and embedded within the MAP Minutes Time Bank, I explore the inner workings of a time banking system and the benefits that an anti-capitalistic society can bring to a community. This project will shed light on time banking as an effective and sustainable way to address public health interventions and hopefully working towards restoring community health, and uniting the citizens in the center of networks of support. 


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