Dear Community:

As we settle into a new year, many of us are setting resolutions – for better health, greater balance, and stronger connections. At the Center for Closing the Health Gap, we believe the most meaningful resolutions are the ones that support not only individual well-being, but the health of our families and communities as well.

Our mission is grounded in the idea that everyone deserves the opportunity to live a healthy life, regardless of background or circumstance. That work happens one choice at a time – choosing nutritious food when possible, moving our bodies, caring for our mental health, and seeking preventive care. It also happens when we advocate for systems that make healthy choices more accessible for all.

As you think about your goals for the year ahead, I encourage you to set resolutions that are realistic, compassionate, and rooted in community. Small, consistent steps can lead to lasting change, especially when we take them together.



Wishing you a safe and healthy week ahead!



Renee Mahaffey Harris

President & CEO

Closing the Health Gap's Renee Mahaffey Harris Joins Bizwomen Mentoring Monday on February 23

Whether you’re just launching your career, navigating mid-level growth, or leading at the top, Mentoring Monday offers insights, strategies, and connections to help you move forward. During the event, you will find:

• One-on-one conversations with accomplished women leaders
• Practical advice tailored to your career goals
• New professional connections across industries

Our mentors represent diverse fields, including banking, wealth management, health care, technology, real estate, law, nonprofits, government, marketing, entrepreneurship, & more. This event will also feature an engaging and inspiring panel discussion featuring three accomplished women who will share unique perspectives on mentoring at every stage of a career. Pam Webb, Principal at Integral Ops, Kabrella Clark, Senior Program & Operations Manager at the Cincinnati Regional Chamber, and Amy Thompson, President and Chief Executive Officer at the Cincinnati Youth Collaborative, will help listeners understand how mentoring relationships evolve, how to seek and sustain meaningful connections no matter your season of life, and how mentorship can be both a guide and a catalyst for growth at every step of your journey.

The deadline to purchase tickets is February 16, 2026. Tickets purchased after February 17th, if available, will be $80.

Patients from poorer neighborhoods at greater risk of post-surgery death

Patients from disadvantaged neighborhoods are at greater risk of dying within 30 days of elective surgery than those from wealthier neighborhoods, according to a cohort study of more than one million patients in Ontario.

The sample included Ontario patients who underwent planned surgery between 2017 and 2023. However, there is no reason to believe that the situation would be any different for Quebec patients, according to Sandy Torres, a sociologist at the Quebec Observatory on Inequality.

She is not at all surprised to see that there is an association between poverty and an increased risk of mortality, in this case dying after surgery. “We find the same kind of association when we talk about other types of mortality or the risk of hospitalization or health problems in general,” she points out.

Address Health Disparities Through Pharmacist-Led Initiatives in Underserved Communities

Health disparities are preventable gaps in health outcomes that disproportionately burden individuals facing social, economic, or environmental barriers—most often affecting racial and ethnic minorities and individuals with lower socioeconomic status.1 They can be seen in health care access, use, quality, and delivery of clinical care as well as the incidence and mortality from conditions, diseases, and disorders. Disparities can also be observed in the risks, incidence, and problems associated with certain behaviors. Health disparities stem from socioeconomic status, race and ethnicity, geographic location, and language barriers.

“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhuman.”

In March of 1966, Martin Luther King Jr. spoke those words to a group of physicians and civil rights advocates in Chicago. Sixty years later, that sentence still lands with a thud.

We often think of Dr. King as a figure from a black and white past who has been frozen in photographs. But Dr. King and the fight for civil rights were not distant history. He was from the same generation as many millennials’ grandparents. He was fatally shot in 1968, when millions of baby boomers were still in their teens and twenties.

Dr. King was not from a world of horse-drawn carriages and rotary phones. This was the world of the first Super Bowl — won by the Green Bay Packers. The world of Motown, of Stevie Wonder and The Supremes. The world where “Hey Jude” played on the radio and Aretha Franklin demanded “Respect.” Dr. King lived to see commercial jet travel, color televisions and mainframe computers reshape business, government and American life. In cultural time, 1966 is not long ago. It was yesterday.

H.R.1’s Medicaid Cuts Threaten Children’s Health

Cuts to federal Medicaid funding pose a substantial risk to all children, regardless of their insurance coverage. H.R.1, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, focuses on reducing federal spending, partly achieved through substantial changes to Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). According to the Congressional Budget Office, these provisions would increase the number of uninsured individuals by 9.1 million by 2034, a shift that would dramatically alter the pediatric health care landscape.

Digital Inclusion Pathways To Health Equity

Digital inclusion strategies are essential to ensure that digital health technology advances, rather than undermines, health equity. Although recent policy rollbacks have slowed the digital inclusion momentum built during the pandemic, policy makers and health systems have many opportunities to sustain and extend health equity gains from the continuing digital health transformation.