Course overview

Roundtable Discussion: Examples of Resilience in Indigenous Communities During COVID-19 Pandemic

In this course, join leaders from indigenous communities in a panel discussion to experience how they cultivated resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic by providing food and traditional medicine to those who needed it most.
 Faculty

Scarlet Soriano, MD, ABIHM

Linda Black Elk

Zowie Banteah-Yuselew

Kelly Noble

Anne White-Hat

 Conference Series

AIHM March 2021 Virtual Conference

 Required Lessons

1

 Time to Complete

1 hour 45 minutes

 Non-CME Eligible*

CME Expired

What you will learn

  • Course Summary

  • For over a year, Linda Black Elk and her family have been working on a grassroots level to provide food and medicine to Indian Country. As the COVID-19 pandemic began, Linda consulted with her family and community about the best ways to feed and heal Indigenous communities ... without perpetuating the high risk conditions that make COVID-19 so dangerous. The suggestions that arose from those meetings became the foundation for “Food Kits for Elders,” which provides organic, traditional, shelf stable food and medicine for elders and anyone in need.

    “Delta Rootz - Solidarity Medicine Making in Response to COVID-19” - A mutual aid model based in Bvbulbancha aka New Orleans spearheaded by White Hat through her membership in Another Gulf is Possible collaborative. Delta Rootz brings together Indigenous herbalists, clinical herbalists, medical school students, furloughed chefs, mothers, and community organizers to brew and distribute a line of herbal medicines they’ve formulated to support COVID-19 positive and those healing from the long-term effects of the virus. Initial distribution of the care packages was to the hardest hit Indigenous urban and rural reservation communities in South Dakota and has since grown to national distribution. The effort has also spawned a much larger effort that empowers those communities to become their own medicine makers through the Fire Cider Drum Project, which is expanding to support migrants and refugees in camps along the US/Mexico border and in urban communities in the Gulf South.
    By the end of this course, learners will be able to:

    • Understand the reasons traditional foods and medicines are so important in fighting COVID-19 in Indigenous communities.
    • Understand the importance of decolonizing food distribution in all communities.
    • Provide a variety of suggestions for healthy food acquisition and preservation without going to a grocery store.
    • Learn about the benefits of the Delta Rootz mutual aid model to COVID-19 patients.
    • Learn about the line of herbal medicines that Delta Rootz has formulated for their care packages to support COVID-19 positive and those healing.
    • Learn about the benefits of working with plants to support the treatment of COVID-19 patients and their recovery.
    • Increase awareness of COVID-19 in Indigenous Communities.
    • Exploration of opportunities, impact, and lessons learned.
    • Collective action brought to light to highlight resiliency and empowerment in an Indigeno community us.

Course includes:

  • Video recording
  • Downloadable audio
  • Speaker handout(s)
  • 1 Quiz
  • 1 Evaluation
  • Certificate of Completion

Included in this course

Course Faculty

Scarlet Soriano, MD, ABIHM

Faculty Disclosure: No financial relationships with any ineligible companies to disclose.
About Scarlet
Dr. Scarlet Soriano is a health and wellness leader, consultant, speaker and coach. She develops wellness programs across a wide range of health-related institutions, with a focus on designing Integrative medicine patient and employee clinical programs. Dr. Soriano uses a wide range of skills to support her clients in their journey of institutional transformation, starting with a process of re-envisioning foundational concepts of healthcare delivery; then moving through all aspects of design and implementation, and extending into measuring, sustaining and expanding impact of programs post-launch. Dr. Soriano is passionate about expanding access to evidence-based Integrative and wellness-based healing modalities to minorities and underserved populations.

Dr. Soriano is a founding member of the AIHM’s Black, Indigenous and People of Color Taskforce. She has recently joined the Board of the AIHM. Before launching as a wellness consultant in 2020, Dr. Soriano was Director for Group Visits at the Program for Integrative Medicine and Health Disparities at Boston Medical Center. Since 2018, she has been the Director for Wellness-Based Healthcare Transformation at Boston Medical Center. She is former Medical Director of the Tanya I Edwards, MD Center for Integrative and Lifestyle Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic. Dr. Soriano is the current Medical Director for the upcoming Hopespring Holistic Health Institute in Maine. Dr. Soriano has worked in settings that range from rural to urban, serving a wide range of patients and communities.

Linda Black Elk

Faculty Disclosure: No financial relationships with any ineligible companies to disclose.
About Linda
Linda Black Elk is an ethnobotanist specializing in teaching about culturally important plants and their uses as food, medicine, and materials. Linda works to build curriculum and ways of thinking that will promote and protect food sovereignty, traditional plant knowledge, and environmental quality as an extension of the fight against hydraulic fracturing and the fossil fuels industry. She has written for numerous publications, and is the author of “Watoto Unyutapi”, a field guide to edible wild plants of the Dakota people. Linda currently serves as the Food Sovereignty Coordinator at United Tribes Technical College in Bismarck, North Dakota and spends her free time with her husband and three sons, who are all citizens of the Oceti Sakowin.

Zowie Banteah-Yuselew

Faculty Disclosure: No financial relationships with any ineligible companies to disclose.
About Zowie
Lukkya Zowie Banteah-Yuselew. Zowie Dakkya:kwe deyan Yadokkya:k a:wan cha'le. Zowie Banteah-Yuselew born and raised in the Zuni Pueblo belongs to the Frog clan and a child of the Sun clan. An educator for 17 years, Zowie is passionate about her youth in her Indigenous community of Zuni, New Mexico.  Zowie has been a community advocate primarily in positive youth development as she believes all children have gifts and talents they have yet to uncover. She has taught grades 1-4, and 7th & 8th grades. Currently, Zowie teaches 3rd grade at Shiwi Ts'ana Elementary in Zuni, NM. The reason why she chose teaching was to instill how important a child's self-worth is, to have their whole being recognized and celebrated and when a child is equipped with knowledge of who they are as well as the gifts of academics; it can lead them to be strong and empowered individuals no matter where they go. Zowie wanted to teach in her community because she felt it was important to give back. Last year she partnered with another mom to start a community pantry when COVID-19 hit. This endeavor brought her and a small group of like minded individuals to serve their community as volunteers.

Kelly Noble

Faculty Disclosure: No financial relationships with any ineligible companies to disclose.
About Kelly
Kelly K. Noble is a member of the Zuni Pueblo and is of Zuni/Cherokee decent. She is a mom of 4 and grandmother of 3. She is currently the Division Director of Public Works, for the Pueblo of Zuni. Kelly is a partner of the Emergency Mobile Pantry.

Anne White-Hat

Faculty Disclosure: No financial relationships with any ineligible companies to disclose.
About Anne
Anne White Hat, Ohitikawin, is a member of the Aśke Gluwipi Tiośpaye of the Sicangu Lakota, one the Seven Council Fires of the Oćeti Śakowin, the Lakota Nation and a direct descendant of Chief Hollow Horn Bear. She is the proud mother of three, a community organizer, and founding member of the Indigenous Women’s Advisory Council of the L’eau Est La Vie -No Bayou Bridge Resistance Camp, Board Member of the Lakota Wellness Society, and member of Another Gulf Is Possible collaborative. White Hat Botanicals is her trade name featuring what she calls her ‘community determined’ botanicals and CBD remedies. She is a co-founder of Delta Rootz solidarity medicine making collective in Bvbancha aka New Orleans. She is a grant writer by trade, community organizer out of love for her people, jack of all trades by hustle and blessed to work with plants for you.

*CME/CEU Credits

The CME for this course has expired, however you will continue to have access to your purchased content. 

Enroll Now!

This course is self-paced with no set beginning or end date. You may complete this course on your own schedule and pace. Enrolling in and purchasing this course grants you access to its contents in perpetuity. All required course activities must be completed to earn any eligible continuing education credit(s) and obtain a certificate of completion for this course. 
The views and opinions expressed in this activity are those of the faculty and do not necessarily reflect the views of the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine and/or the Academy of Integrative Health & Medicine.