Home Page – Healthy Conversations for Vibrant Nations
A web blog discussing current health and public policy issues in the US and globally
In a recent news article I read about disputes in the city of San Francisco over the location of a shelter for the homeless. As a physician who started his career in the United States working for Healthcare for the Homeless in Baltimore, Maryland this issue is not alien to me. Whilst services for the […]
In this thought provoking post a women’s advocate talks about the challenges and realities of working with female victims of domestic abuse. The writer discusses the difficulties associated with addressing this problem in low & middle income nations like Ghana versus developed world settings.
Right after the elections of Barack Obama, the first Black president of the United States, I heard lots of people including some TV analysts declare that America has entered a “post-racial” era where one’s skin colour did not determine his destiny! With my usual shithole sceptism; I could not help but wonder how such declarations […]
I look at my life currently and proclaim that truly, America is the greatest country on Earth! I firmly believe my story is only possible in the United States of America! I also give due recognition that I work hard for what I am now. I live in an upper middle class neighbourhood. I am […]
In turbulent times like this, I am reminded of Shithole folklore in which the frog laments why it has to suffer whenever the lizard eats pepper! This is how the lizard’s song goes; “I don’t want any troubles, and so I mind my own business, so why should my ass burn and my eyes weep when […]
These days when I hear people say; “I love your accent, where is it from?” I wonder if I should say “thank you” or run for my passport just in case ICE will be in pursuit soon. My English is as good as my genetics will allow (you see both of my parents come from […]
In Election year 2016, forty-two percent of Americans did not vote, a significant proportion of them like myself were recent immigrants from “shithole” countries! I guess most of them believed their votes won’t matter or sway anything here in the United States of America! Before they make any such fatal decisions not to vote on […]
As any self respecting Baltimore resident I sometimes see business deals in terms of street culture. I must admit though that I am no expert in street culture however a conversation that I had with a Baltimore Street homeboy who claims to have personally known the real Nathan “Bodie” Barksdale the inspiration for the street […]
Over the past two decades the United States has experienced an uncontrollable epidemic of drug related deaths. In 2016 sixty-three thousand Americans died of drug overdoses, two out of three of these deaths were due to opioids. In times like this whilst law enforcement and public health services grapple for solutions most may ask the […]
The whole of last week most of us have been debating or considering one way or the other if an individual accused but never convicted of attempted rape should be allowed to sit on the highest judicial bench in the land. That decision is a really big decision and would eventually be decided by our […]
Happy Tuesday FB friends and family. I am a sole believer for educating and promoting awareness in Baltimore and beyond about HIV Prevention but I have several issues with this article that was featured on Fox’s webpage written by Marilynn Marchion, AP Chief Medical Writer and also Fox news reporter Patrice Sanders reported this topic […]
A good essay on the everyday issues that individuals with HIV experience in their efforts to live their lives with respect to love and relationships. This article uses the experiences of people living with HIV to inform on issues related to safer sex and HIV prevention,
I have been very lucky when it come to religious education. I grew up in the Anglican Church; actually my elementary education was in a school affiliated with the Church. In those days we would all march to the church on Ash Wednesday to get the grey black crosses on our foreheads after school assembly. […]
I lived with my single mother for the first 10 years of my life. At age ten I was distraught when my mother suggested I had to go live with my father because I needed a father figure to look up to! To ease my stay with my dad I had to spend some vacation […]
It has become abundantly clear to me that black people in America belong to a different subspecies of Homo sapiens! I have grouped them into a subspecies Homo sapiens blackus, and in my case Sub Subspecies Homo sapiens blackus shitus! How else can anyone explain the spate of calls that are made to cops about […]
A part of the New Testament, John 8:7 actually suggests …..“He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone at her.”… This was after an adulterer was accused and brought to Jesus. In 1 Cor 4:5. Luke 6:37, Matthew 7:1 and James 4:11, Romans 2:1, 14:10, 14:13 Christians are advised and […]
Living in the great multi-cultural society, which is today’s America is an opportunity that I have grown to love and cherish. I love the fact that when I step out on the streets I could be interacting with individuals whose gene pool could easily span the whole global realm known to man. This in itself […]
Whilst boarding school in Ghana for me was mostly fun that was not all that I experienced in Mfantsipim School, one of the oldest schools in Ghana. My first 3 years in boarding school as a junior boy was fraught with many experiences that could well give Tom Brown’s School Days a run for its […]
Before I came to America I was made to believe that America was this “melting pot” of people from all over the world. A huge successful experiment where people from all walks of life and continents who value American culture and ethos emigrate to and become American, whilst at the same time maintaining their unique […]
Broad street in Philadelphia is this wide swathe of black, running through the middle of the city. A black big motoring vein with asphalt tributaries emptying cars, and people, milling restlessly with a tenacity that hardly ever changes. The City Hall punctuates it, splitting the broad street flow with its imposing gravity defying white columns […]