By Adonis Huggins
(Adonis is a staff journalist with the Focus Media Arts Centre)
 
Black Wellness Hubs are temporary pop-ups located in neighbourhoods with high black populations. Organized by various services providers that serve the Black community, the goal of these hubs is to promote health and wellness to community members through an inclusive, ethno-racial and welcoming lens.

Although each hub is unique, generally they provide an opportunity to eat good food, listen to great music and visit health focused tables to learn about health, get your blood sugar and blood pressure checked, and talk directly to various health professionals.  The hubs are also an opportunity for community members to get a Covid-19 vaccine.  Although these pop-ups are usually only one day long, they serve to connect residents to health resources in the community.   

There has been several Black Community Wellness Hubs that have been held in the St. James Town and Regent Park Community in the past few months. These hubs have been organized by a collective of groups operating under the Downtown East Vaccine Engagement Partnership Network. The groups include The 519, the St. James Town Community Corner, the Sherbourne Health Centre, the Regent Park Community Centre, Fred Victor Centre, Women’s Health in Women’s Hand, Black Cap and more.

The importance of having these pop-ups is to remind all of us that every community is important and everyone needs to make sure they are healthy no matter what their income level is.

The Black Health Alliance is a community- led registered charity working to improve the health and well-being of Black communities in Canada. According to information found on the Black Health Alliance:
    
Black Canadians represent 2.9% of the overall Canadian population, but represent 18% of Canadians living in poverty in Canada. (Statistics Canada, 2009)

People of Caribbean, East, West African origin in Ontario have 60% increased risk of psychosis. (Anderson, Cheng, Susser, McKenzie, and Kurdyak, 2015)

Black women are 43% more likely to die from breast cancer than White women. (Marc Hurlbert, phD, Chief Mission Officer, Breast Cancer Research Foundation)

A 2012 report by the Wellesley Institute found Black immigrants in Canada were 76% more likely to assess themselves as “unhealthy” than other racialized groups.

According to the 2016 Census, the Black population in Regent Park is 13.6%. Health stats like the ones highlighted above, show why it is important to have Black Community Wellness Hubs in Regent Park, St. James Town and other communities in Toronto with high Black populations.