Five on Friday: Giving Thanks

Migrant health justice has never been more relevant, more salient, or more urgent. On this Thanksgiving weekend, we send our deep gratitude to the millions of farmworkers who migrate every few weeks to a new farm, to do the backbreaking work required to grow and harvest the staple foods that fill our plates with the tastes, the aromas, the comforts that make up our central memories of Thanksgiving. We all eat, every day, because of the work that you do. We also express our sincere appreciation for our active and growing network of clinicians who have dedicated their professional lives to serving these migrants and many others who are equally underserved, whose health needs are often overlooked. Thank you for your hard work! During these times of gratitude, we invite you to support your fellow clinicians, invest in health, and elevate our collective voice through a donation to MCN for #GivingTuesday. Please visit our donation page -- and encourage your friends to do so, as well. Many thanks to our supporters.

Here is a special Thanksgiving edition of Five on Friday, focused on the farmworkers who bring us the food on our plates.

This week, California regulators recommended “new restrictions on popular pesticide blamed for harming babies,” in the wake of the federal government’s inaction on the well-studied neurotoxic chlorpyrifos.

While schools closed and residents were told to stay inside, California farmworkers were still in the fields. Air quality from the terrifying fires around the Golden State dropped into the ‘hazardous’ category in many locations.

On the other side of the country, after facing an entirely different sort of disaster: “Months After Hurricane Florence, Undocumented Farmworkers Still Struggle to Recover.”

Proposed rules to public charge will greatly affect our farmworker communities. Check out the resource page of our partner organization, Farmworker Justice, to learn more and make sure to leave a comment before the December 10th deadline.

Another relevant piece from Civil Eats: “Workers Fear Injury as Administration Clears Way for Faster Chicken Slaughter.”

Have a safe and healthy Thanksgiving weekend.

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