OPINION | Harriet Tubman's Legacy — A Call to Reform Health Care

by Danisha Jefferson-Abye, MPH, LMT

March 10 marks 202 years since the birth of Harriet Tubman, a heroine who became an icon for bravely leading dozens of people out of slavery.

This Harriet Tubman Day, let's remember her as even more than a historic figure. Let's look to her as a visionary, healer, and Union Army nurse who recognized that attaining our physical well-being is intertwined with the broader struggle for Black liberation.

This connection between health and freedom endures for those of us working to attain both in the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King County, where Black and Native communities tend to live shorter lives and have higher chances of facing health problems, like diabetes, heart disease, and stroke, compared with other communities. Now, as we work to secure a healthy future for our community in the face of systems that are designed to oppress us and keep us sick, Ms. Tubman's life can continue to guide us.

Her work as a nurse meant more than eliminating disease or addressing its symptoms. Tending to Black soldiers and newly liberated people, she offered care that affirmed people's dignity. In a society where enslaved people were denied the most basic freedom — and where Black healing practices were frequently punished with murder — Ms. Tubman shared the gifts of ancestral wisdom and carried on a tradition of healing as an act of resistance.

As an abolitionist and suffragist, she fought to reshape society and dismantle systems — like the system of slavery — that strip us of bodily autonomy and disregard our humanity. After the Civil War, she continued calling for justice. She gave speeches speaking on women's suffrage, civil rights, and access to health care. She created community institutions and healing spaces, including freedmen's schools and the Harriet Tubman Home for Black elders. Her revolutionary work matched her immense vision.

In 2024, she remains a guide.

All too often, as Black patients entering white health care institutions, we experience dehumanizing care. I have lost my own loved ones to negligent, substandard care. As a health care provider and public health leader, I am not alone in hearing the countless horror stories of disempowerment, medical racism, and sheer disregard of Black and Brown lives.

A recent national study from the Commonwealth Fund and the African American Research Collaborative illustrates dynamics our community knows to be true. According to the study, 47% of health care workers have witnessed racial discrimination against patients in their facilities, and nearly 1 in 2 say racism against patients is a major problem. This data helps to illuminate why at least 25% of Black adults in King County have no regular source of primary care, even though 90% of us have insurance. Many of us have opted out of a system that treats us like a problem, disrespects our traditional medicines, and subjects us to inferior, often harmful care.

Perhaps the most important lesson we can take from Ms. Harriet Tubman's work is that liberation makes us healthier. Extensive research shows that when people have more control and power in their lives, they are healthier. We need a comprehensive approach to health care that addresses the oppressive systems that make us sick. Culturally appropriate care must include dismantling systems of harm through public policy. Furthermore, the solutions to improve health must come from those most impacted.

Compared with many places across the country, our area is medically resource rich. But "resource rich" carries so little meaning when health disparities remain stark and there are still so many without the care they need and deserve. This should serve as an invitation to continue to follow Ms. Tubman's lead. In honor of Ms. Tubman, the Tubman Center for Health & Freedom is building a beacon that will serve those who have been left on the sidelines, and that will be a place where care is offered through a lens of liberation and Black love.

The South Seattle Emerald is committed to holding space for a variety of viewpoints within our community, with the understanding that differing perspectives do not negate mutual respect amongst community members.

The opinions, beliefs, and viewpoints expressed by the contributors on this website do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs, and viewpoints of the Emerald or official policies of the Emerald.

Danisha Jefferson-Abye, MPH, LMT, is the founder and chief operating officer at the Tubman Center for Health & Freedom.

Featured image by Harvey Lindsley, from the Library of Congress.