M3.3 Environmental Justice

        The topic of environmental justice heavily influences the general health of certain populations. I grew up in San Francisco and the most toxic neighborhoods were not only plagued with environmental pollutants, but they also were afflicted with violence, poverty and lack of healthcare resources. Growing up in the Mission District during the 90s, I witnessed and experienced first hand the poor living conditions of low-income neighborhoods.

         Most of the residents of these low-income neighborhoods (the Mission, Tenderloin and Hunter’s Point) were non-white including African Americans, Hispanics, Polynesians and Asians – mostly immigrants. When my mother and I first immigrated to America, we had no other means but to live with my grandparents and six other residents in a cramped one-bedroom apartment in a dilapidated vermin infested apartment building erected in the late 1800s. The landlady was irresponsible and refused to renovate the apartment or provide any pest control. At that time, the Mission district was plagued with gang violence and environmental pollutants – it was just plain ghetto! I remember being chased home by a psychotic person who was just discharged from the SFGH psych unit.

         Compared to my cousins who grew up in the suburbs of Daly City, my brother and I experienced stunted growth (we were shorter in stature) and I suffered from depression as evidenced by poor performance in school. My brother and I also suffered frequent respiratory conditions, due to poor air quality and the exhaust from motor vehicles outside our apartment building when we lived in the Mission district.

         When my father joined us in America after seven years of waiting for his sponsorship to be approved by the American government, he landed a job that gave us the financial momentum to move into the environmentally cleaner and safer suburbs of Daly City. My health improved dramatically with the change of environment, I suffered fewer respiratory conditions and less episodes of depression. I got my life to together and had the motivation to build my future in nursing.

         As an eyewitness, I am a believer and supporter of environmental justice. Not only does environmental injustice affect the African American populations here in the United States, it also victimizes the low-income and immigrant populations. Although the movement for environmental justice is aligned to the cause of the “Black Lives Movement,” I believe that environmental justice is a right for all.