SAN DIEGO, Oct. 30 — In the midst of a capitalist financial meltdown and days before the presidential elections,  some 13,000 people attended the American Public Health Association (APHA) annual conference. In line with its theme  of “Public Health Without Borders.”

  The conference was held in this city near the U.S./Mexico border with Tijuana, the most populated border crossing in the world. 

And yet, aside from slogans and location, there was little mention of the racist attacks on immigrant workers on this side of the border or the wage-slave conditions of workers in the Maquiladoras on the other. At least that was the case until a contingent of PLP health workers started raising the political issues more sharply.

It was clear when an anti-racist resolution advanced by activists was quickly rejected by the APHA leadership that they had no plans of even acknowledging the racist attacks on immigrant workers.  Not unlike the decline of the anti-war movement or immigrant rights movement, or struggle around the Jena 6, what prior struggles that existed in APHA were virtually replaced with the movement to get Barack Obama into the White House.  However, our Party contingent, consisting of veteran and younger comrades, was able to organize a couple of events that culminated in a march and demonstration from the convention center to the Federal Building.

Just in the past year, racist attacks on immigrant workers have intensified with increased raids and deportations by the ICE (the Immigration Gestapo). There are now over 300,000 immigrant workers held in detention centers throughout the U.S. which is already more than double the number of Japanese interned in concentration camps during WWII.  Immigrant workers are dying in these detention centers as health care is being delayed and/or denied. Our resolution highlighted these racist public health attacks on our immigrant brothers and sisters and called on APHA to make a public statement opposing this racist injustice.

One APHA caucus had originally planned a bus tour of the Maquiladoras in Tijuana but was forced to change plans due to the increasing gang violence. Instead they held a small forum at a community college in the area.  At that gathering we passed out copies of our resolution and called on the group to organize a protest at the border wall.  The leadership of the group dismissed our suggestion but others supported it.  With the leadership of a young comrade and a young doctor we met there, we were able to use the next few days to organize in our various workshops to build for our “radicals breakfast” as well as the march on the Federal Building.

At the opening plenary, California comrades helped us distribute a PLP flier stating that, “as public health people, we are right in the middle of a crossfire. In our clinics and hospitals we can see how capitalism’s inequality spreads sickness and death. Today’s keynote speaker, Michael Marmot, has written a great deal about the ‘social determinants of health.’ The ‘Unnatural Causes’ PBS series makes the point clearly that inequality is making us sick. Yet none of the critics of this savage inequality will name the real cause. Much is said about the web of causation, but nobody will name the spider. The spider is capitalism. It cannot be tamed. It must be destroyed!” CHALLENGE was sold outside the plenary and distributed to our friends hand to hand. Another flier exposed Obama’s connections with Wall Street bankers and warmongers like Colin Powell. 

At our “radical breakfast” one young black woman we met the day before exemplified the younger public health activists we need to attract in larger numbers. Her impassioned account of fighting for the health needs of her Mexican immigrant clients in a small southern city was inspiring to hear. Other friends, including colleagues and CHALLENGE readers met at earlier conferences, joined in the discussion about how to build a more activist group in APHA.

At our demo, we organized over 20 people, multiracial, young and old, that marched and chanted “Public Health Means, We Got to Fight Back” and “Down with Borders, Up with Health!”  We met two young hotel union organizers that joined and brought their bullhorns to amplify our message.  Overall, it was a small and yet spirited group, which wants to continue these actions in the upcoming conferences.  We also met many others before and after the march, exchanged contact information and forged new relationships that we hope to develop over the year.  More importantly, it also energized our veteran comrades and we’ll be planning more events to strengthen our work in our locations, like the fight against 500 new layoffs in the Cook County Health System.  This work needs to intensify as the deepening economic crisis and expanding wars intensify the attacks on public health and safety-net hospitals where many of us work.