KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The University of Missouri - Kansas City's School of Nursing and Health Studies hosted a first of its kind public health summit Wednesday morning at the Kauffman Foundation Conference Center.
The Syndemic Solutions Summit focused on what’s called a syndemic approach to ending five health epidemics: HIV, STI’s, viral hepatitis, substance use and mental health, and reproductive and sexual health.
Around 200 people were part of Wednesday’s conversations, including public health officials, researchers, people with lived experience and more. The discussions surrounding the syndemic approach held multiple layers.
Linda Scruggs showed up committed to these conversations.
“It really is about meeting people first, not meeting people where they are but meeting people first so we can find where they are,” she said.
She knows first-hand how this summit is breaking barriers.
“I’m also a woman diagnosed with HIV for over 30 years,” she said.
Ever since that moment, Scruggs committed her life to being part of the change. She’s an executive co-director for Ribbon, a national nonprofit that works to end disparities within health communities.
“We have to create systems that break down other 'isms,'" Scruggs said. "Those other discriminatory places, those other factors of stigma."
Dr. Jonathan Mermin, CDC Director of the National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention (NCHHSTP), was the summit’s keynote speaker. He said a syndemic approach is good public health.
“If we are only working on one specific issue, sometimes we’re not as cost effective or efficient as if we were thinking more comprehensively about the health of the entire population and all of their needs,” he said.
He said the CDC has its own layered approach on this effort: meeting people where they are, thinking about the policies in place that influence people’s health, and ensuring the scientific innovations they’re working on allow a more comprehensive approach.
“Different diseases and infections affect different populations at different rates,” he said.
He said this is why the CDC is looking at all of the issues influencing populations and trying to help them stay healthy.
“HIV and viral hepatitis, sexually transmitted infections, they’re occurring in some of the same populations that are also experiencing poverty, drug use, or mental health issues, and these overlap,” he said.
The summit is the start of the solution. It’s why Scruggs said a Michael Jackson song reminds her that, when facing life’s obstacles, the only way out is through.
“How do we find the man in the mirror? It’s not who I look at every day, it’s who I dream to be.”
