Applying Racial Equity to U.S. Federal Nutrition Assistance Programs - Flipbook - Page 37
Given the racially inequitable history of licensing in the
healthcare field, WIC should thoroughly reexamine the
assumptions behind its credential requirements for positions
such as peer counselor and lactation consultant. Policies should
be revised to reflect the education, skills, and experience shown
to be essential to the positions. WIC should develop strategies
to expand access to the necessary education and training
among interested WIC participants and others for whom lack of
resources are a barrier.
These measures will preserve high standards for the services
that WIC offers while also making access to career opportunities
for peer counselors and others more racially equitable. In turn,
increasing the representation of people of color in these positions
will enable WIC to connect more closely with its clients and
provide support that is more relevant to participating mothers’
experience. For further detailed recommendations on what the
larger public health field and WIC policies can do to ensure racial
equity, see Appendix 15.
SPOTLIGHT
Courtesy of OITBC
and licensing and were forced out of the profession. African
Americans and other people of color still have far less access to
the resources needed to obtain certificates and licensing and to
recertify at prescribed intervals—due in large part to the racial
wealth divide.
The Oregon Inter-Tribal Breastfeeding
Coalition (OITBC) provides culturally
sensitive prenatal and postnatal support
for Indigenous women and their families.
The coalition has a strengths-based
framework that teaches breastfeeding as
an ancestral practice and reinforces this
concept using other traditional practices.
“The whole family is involved to fortify
the ongoing support a mother has
post labor, and to honor the strength
present in each family unit, as well as
the strength from our ancestors.”
Ensure that WIC participants of color have access to peer
support from other women of color. This should include hiring
proportional numbers of women of color as community health
workers. In addition, Congress should dedicate funding to train
—Roberta Ortiz, LE, CD, CHW, Oglala Sioux/
more African American and Indigenous lactation consultants
Yomba Shoshone, Founder of the Oregon
Inter-Tribal Breastfeeding Coalition
and community health workers. In addition to paying for their
training, WIC agencies should also be funded to pay trainees for
their time, at a living wage, to reduce barriers to participation.
Lactation consultants and community health workers of color can provide
culturally relevant support that takes into account historical trauma
and
structural racism (see glossary), which impact the breastfeeding
DID YOU KNOW THAT…
rates of WIC participants of color. See Appendix 5 for additional
recommendations on improving equity in credential requirements and
Breastfeeding rates among Latinas
Appendix 28 for more on empowering women of color to serve other
tend to decrease the longer they
women of color.
have lived in the United States?
Increase funding for targeted peer-to-peer breastfeeding support
This suggests that an overall
for African American, Indigenous, and Native Hawaiian women,
cultural shift in our country is
and for research on the design and impact of these programs.
needed to ensure that policies,
Tribal centers should have the resources they need to provide
practices, and advertisements
breastfeeding support, but many tribal WIC offices are underfunded,
encourage breastfeeding among
reducing the opportunity for breastfeeding support via classes. In some
all mothers, regardless of race or
cases, respondents reported that non-tribal WIC agencies required
income status.
Indigenous participants to drive long distances to receive support
instead of allowing the tribal office to teach classes—despite the fact that
SOURCE: Gibson-Davis CM, Brooks-Gunn J. Couples’
tribal offices had established trust, honored cultural traditions, and
immigration status and ethnicity as determinants of
breastfeeding. Am J Public Health. 2006;96:641–646
were located near participants.
A BREAD FOR THE WORLD INSTITUTE SPECIAL REPORT
37
