Happening Soon

November 25, 2024 through August 1, 2025

Health Is a Human Right: Achieving Health Equity examines the ways communities across the U.S. are advancing health equity in the 21st century. Focused on “good news wins,” we tell stories about how people, organizations and governments are working to ensure that every person has opportunities to achieve the best possible health outcomes.

The exhibition acknowledges that the only way everyone will have a fair opportunity to achieve their best health is to acknowledge the harms of the past while also looking ahead to what is possible. We look at models of “communities of practice”—how individuals, nonprofits, and local, state, tribal, and federal governments are reframing both problems and solutions to make sustainable differences.

The stories are representative of larger efforts across the U.S. to achieve health equity. They range from housing and transportation innovations to the role of faith leaders in promoting health equity to educational advancements to solutions for addressing environmental health challenges. We also discuss the importance of data in all these efforts.

In addition to photographs, documents, and media, the exhibition features objects such as a voting booth used in a participatory budgeting process in Rhode Island and a red shawl representative of the activism to address the Missing and Murdered Indigenous People crisis. Another highlight is an interactive exploring CDC’s Environmental Justice Index.

A collaboration between the David J. Sencer CDC Museum and CDC’s Office of Health Equity, Health Is a Human Right: Achieving Health Equity includes contributions from more than 100 individuals, organizations, and government agencies from across the U.S.