In light of the global COVID-19 pandemic, WECAN International is responding to requests for deeper community connection and engagement at this moment in time. Please join us on Wednesday, March 25 for our webinar, “Caring for Our Communities: COVID-19 and our Health, Connections to Climate Preparedness, and Systemic Change". Although, we will be focusing this webinar on a North American context, we will be addressing global issues.

Caring for Our Communities:

COVID-19 and our Health, Connections to

Climate Preparedness, and Systemic Change

Wednesday, March 25, 2020

1:00 pm PST/ 4:00 pm EST USA time

Speakers include

Rupa Marya, MD

Rupa Marya, MD is an Associate Professor of Medicine at UCSF and faculty director of the Do No Harm Coalition, an organization of over 450 health workers committed to structural change to address health problems. At the invitation of Ohlone native community, she served in medical response at the Standing Rock prayer camp, as indigenous people were encountering increasing police violence while protecting their right to clean drinking water. She was invited by Lakota health leaders and elders to help set up a permanent community clinic for the practice of decolonized medicine at Standing Rock—the Mni Wiconi Health Clinic and Farm. Dr. Marya addresses health issues at the nexus of racism and state violence through her medical work and international outreach with her band, Rupa and the April Fishes. 

Linda Black Elk (Catawba Nation)

Linda Black Elk (Catawba Nation) is an ethnobotanist specializing in teaching about culturally important plants and their uses as food and medicine. She works as Director of Food Sovereignty Programs at United Tribes Technical College and is part of the Mni Wiconi Clinic and Farm, which is a free, integrative healing center of the Standing Rock Nation that focuses on decolonizing medicine and diet for Indigenous peoples. Linda works to protect food sovereignty, traditional plant knowledge, and environmental quality as an extension of the fight against hydraulic fracturing and the fossil fuels industry. She has written for numerous publications, and is the author of “Watoto Unyutapi”, a field guide to edible wild plants of the Dakota people. 

Jacqui Patterson

Jacqueline Patterson is the Director of the NAACP Environmental and Climate Justice Program. Since 2007 Patterson has served as coordinator & co-founder of Women of Color United. Jacqui Patterson has worked as a researcher, program manager, coordinator, advocate and activist working on women‘s rights, violence against women, HIV&AIDS, racial justice, economic justice, and environmental and climate justice. Patterson holds a master’s degree in social work from the University of Maryland and a master’s degree in public health from Johns Hopkins University. She currently serves on the International Committee of the US Social Forum, the Steering Committee for Interfaith Moral Action on Climate, Advisory Board for Center for Earth Ethics as well as on the Boards of Directors for the Institute of the Black World, Center for Story Based Strategy and the US Climate Action Network.

In conversation with

Osprey Orielle Lake

Osprey Orielle Lake is the Founder and Executive Director of the Women's Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN) International, working nationally and internationally with grassroots and frontline women leaders, policy-makers, and diverse coalitions to build women's leadership, climate justice, resilient communities, and a just transition to a decentralized, democratized clean energy future. Osprey is honored to serve on the Executive Committee for the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature, and has been a core organizer of various International Rights of Nature Tribunals. 

In the span of weeks, the outbreak of the coronavirus (COVID-19) has left our communities and countries in a state of immediate crisis as we seek to " flatten the curve" to protect folks most vulnerable to illness, support those already deeply impacted by COVID-19, and to not overwhelm depleted health care systems.

 

As I write this newsletter, I am in the San Francisco Bay Area, California, where we are in complete lockdown (as are other communities). Everyone is to " shelter in place" for at least the next three weeks in our region. At WECAN, we take great stock of the many ways our communities globally can hold us in times of crisis: organizers are engaging community networks to support and provide for those most vulnerable to COVID-19 or who have no place to shelter; people are sharing tips and resources for taking care of children as school doors close; neighbors are checking in with one another more often; and we see how people's desire for community is building stronger.

We also stand in solidarity with all those who have experienced acts of racism and sinophobia because of this virus, and with those who cannot afford to take work off, find safety at home, have access to needed resources or shelter. The injustices of our current system are made plan and clear in crises, and this must change through our ongoing grassroots organizing.

We offer enormous gratitude to all the doctors, nurses, medical staff, and health practitioners around the world who are working long and exhausting hours and risking their own lives to help those in need or who have contracted COVID-19. We give thanks to the community workers at grocery stores, gas stations, and pharmacies, as well as to the teachers and public officials who are offering necessary services to our communities and who are also at risk.

We are carrying the hope that examples of mutual care, solidarity, and human resilience will bring great strength and insight in the wake of escalating crises and disruptions that are part of living in these times— including the climate and environmental crisis. As people globally are limiting their activities and travels due to COVID-19, we are all being forced, right now, to stop in some manner. To stop and shift our everyday activities, and to hopefully stop and listen to a world that is changing forever. This act of listening and moving in solidarity is part of finding our way forward.

The detrimental global systems of domination, exploitation, predator capitalism, colonization and racism continue to rip into our society, marginalizing Indigenous peoples, communities of color, and low-income communities in national efforts to address COVID-19. We want our governments to fundamentally transform in order to truly function and care for people and planet— and we condemn any government seeking to profit off this public heath crisis, or giving bailouts to the financial institutions and fossil fuel companies that have continued to reap unjust rewards for making our communities and the Earth sick. 

While the origins of COVID-19 are still being determined, we see a clear reflection of how the dominant culture's disrespectful and exploitative relationship with Nature and other living beings is fostering an environment where COVID-19 is generated. These same ideologies and behaviors that led to the climate crisis display a human relationship with Nature that is devastatingly out of balance. To live in a healthy and just world, we must fundamentally change how we respect and interact with the Earth and each other.

Although, WECAN has cancelled all of our in-person events for this Spring, respecting medical protocols and the concerns of frontline and Indigenous communities, we remain steadfast in our call for systemic change and just climate solutions as we continue ceaselessly with our advocacy efforts and programs, online organizing, research for upcoming reports, tree plantings and forest protection, divestment programming, and many other activities.

For those of you planning to take action with us on April 23rd to pressure financial institutions to divest from fossil fuels and deforestation, we will share more news soon as the Stop the Money Pipeline campaign moves to a digital platform. We know in the face of climate chaos this work is vital to our collective survival.

With all of this in mind, we encourage deepening connections with Mother Earth and our communities, uplifting acts of resilience and resistance, singing from the balconies, creating inspiring art, and organizing digital moments and movements that accelerate global climate justice. We knew in our bones this time was coming, and now we must act in solidarity more than ever, continuing to build a powerful movement founded on principles of justice, love, and a fierce dedication to our planet and each other.

For the Earth and All Generations,

Osprey Orielle Lake

Founder and Executive Director

Women's Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN) International

S T A Y C O N N E C T E D