ABOUT THE MILLENNIUM FELLOWSHIP - CLASS OF 2021
United Nations Academic Impact and MCN are proud to partner on the Millennium Fellowship. In 2021, over 25,000 young leaders on 2,000+ campuses across 153 nations applied to join the Class of 2021. 136 campuses worldwide (just 6%) were selected to host the 2,000+ Millennium Fellows. The Class of 2021 is bold, innovative, and inclusive.
UNITED NATIONS ACADEMIC IMPACT AND MCN PROUDLY PRESENT BRUNA VASCONCELLOS AFFONSO, A MILLENNIUM FELLOW FOR THE CLASS OF 2021.
Faculdade Israelita de Ciências da Saúde Albert Einstein | São Paulo, Brazil | Advancing SDG 10 & UNAI 6
" I truly believe that our project has the potential to help many people and make a difference in many lives in our community. Furthermore, I believe in the knowledge and courage that this Fellowship will give us to do many other projects, and continue to develop and help the health system in Brazil.
I'm very excited and happy to share this moment with my colleagues and work with them because I'm sure we'll do an amazing job. "
Millennium Fellowship Project: Colors of Care | Cores do Cuidado
Research shows that black Brazilians have notably less access to healthcare than their white counterparts. Moreover, nearly a quarter of them feel or have felt discriminated in their health appointments. This situation isn't any different in regards to the COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil, where death rates are 40% higher for Afro-brazilians. In light of such disparities, we understand race as a Social Determinant of Health, which drives this share of our population to less access and poorer care. Colors of Care focuses on diminishing racial prejudices in healthcare, through the awareness and education of healthcare professional teams in Brazil. Colors of Care has three fronts:
(i) Listening to patients and health workers who have suffered, witnessed or practiced any form of racism. These videos and written statements are to be gathered into an awareness material;
(ii) Building a booklet and posters which explore racism in healthcare to be distributed digitally and in primary care clinics (PCCs) of our Public Health System (SUS);
(iii) Enable PCC teams to identify and act on racism in the healthcare environment, through workshops and short training sessions of multiple workers. Our dream is that, after this fellowship, we have the tools to expand our project and, perhaps, create a public ambulatory specialized in the needs of the Afro-brazilian along with the PCC teams we have trained. In the future, we hope this project grows and inspires other healthcare professionals and undergraduates to keep looking for ways to decrease racial disparities and improve quality in care.
While struggling to move on with phases (i) and (ii), we focused our efforts on social media, to educate healthcare professionals and the general population.
3. Who are you serving?
All people who seek healthcare, specially those who are impacted by racism, students and healthcare professionals.
About the Millennium Fellow
Bruna Vasconcellos Affonso is a passionate, committed and excited medical student at Faculdade de Ciencias da Saude Albert Einstein. She was born in São Paulo, Brazil, and did all of her studies in this city. She has always been very interested in science and in the human body, and this passion combined with her will for being around and helping people, made her choose the path of healthcare.
She has always been involved in volunteer work, and at college, she met a group called IHI open School, where she teamed up with other students with the same passion to develop health improvement programs. She enjoys working as a team but she also enjoys leadership jobs, which makes her dream of one day having her own social action services. She hopes to learn a lot this year and learn tools so that she can keep doing her passion.
