If could turn back the clock
and bring Shalon back,
I would literally do anything.
I would happily give everything
if I could see her smiling
face once again.
But sadly,
even if Shalon were here,
it would not change the fact
that between 700 to 800 women
die each year in America
from pregnancy and
childbirth-related complications.
The choice to have a child should never
equate to a death sentence.
The rate of maternal deaths
in America is utterly appalling.
In 2017, NPR and ProPublica reported
that the United States has the highest
rate of maternal mortality
of any developed country in the world.
And the United States is the only country
where that rate is steadily rising.
Black mothers like Shalon
remain the primary group
for maternal mortality.
It is truly reprehensible
that Black women die
at a rate of three to four times
that of white women.
It is absolutely shameful
that 60 percent of those deaths
are totally preventable,
as was my daughter's.
And here's a shocking fact:
according to the report by Health
Resources and Services Administration,
the difference in risk
has been steadily unchanged
for the past six decades --
six decades.
Clearly, current efforts to address
maternal mortality rates
and the racial and health
disparities in that area
remain woefully inadequate.
Only when race stops being the precursor
to how Black women are treated
or not treated in the health care system,
then outcomes will be
drastically different.
I want to be abundantly clear now.
The medical community is failing
Black mothers in America.
For decades,
Black women have been dismissed,
ignored,
disregarded
or at the very least,
they have been not taken seriously
in their interactions
with the health care system.
It's not uncommon for Black women
to experience racism and discrimination
by medical prodivders.
That racism can be blatantly overt
or covertly subtle,
but make no mistake --
it is there.
It didn't matter that Shalon
had a dual PhD
in Sociology and Gerontology;
it didn't even matter that Shalon
had two master's degrees,
one of them a Masters in Public Health
from Johns Hopkins.
It made no difference that Shalon
was a lieutentant commander
in the US Public Health Service,
an alumnus of the world-renowned
Epidemic Intelligence Service,
a highly respected epidimiologist
at the Centers for Disease Control
and president of her own
diversity company.
She was still a Black woman.
A Black woman accessing a system
that saw her as a sterotype
and responded to her as such.
During the three weeks
after her child was born,
Shalon went to her health care providers
again and again in distress.
Obviously with her education and training,
she could and she did articulate
her concerns very clearly.
Yet her cries for help
were minimized and dismissed
by the covert bias
of her medical provider.
That very bias,
fueled by structural racism,
is the root cause
of disparities in health care.
That very bias impacted Shalon's outcome.
That very bias
caused my daughter
to be among the statistics
for 2017.
As a result,
I lost my beautiful, little girl.
My baby girl.
I lost my confidant;
I lost my best friend;
I lost my whole world.
Shalon's daughter lost her mother
and all of the relationship possibilities
that could have existed
between the two of them.
The society may have suffered
the greater loss.
Who knows how many medical advancements
or social justice contributions
Shalon may have made
if only her medical provider
had listened to her
and heeded her cries for help.
We will never know.
But this much we do know.
Behind every one of those 700
to 800 women who die is a family
and a whole social network of loved ones,
including the children
left behind, like Soleil.
Shalon's daughter Soleil
is three years old now.
She has a quick smile --
every bit as brilliant
as her mother's was.
Soleil is fearless.
She's determined
and she's so opinionated --
(Laughter)
so smart.
Soleil constantly amazes me
at how confidently
she is navigating her world.
But Soleil only knows her mother
through photographs
and the cherished memories that I have
and share with her every day.
Yet Soleil loves her mommy,
who was with her
for only three short weeks --
she tells me so each day.
My heart aches each time
Soleil cries for her mommy.
It is during those times
Soleil has said to me,
"Nana, I want to go to heaven
so I can be with my mommy."
It should not be that way.
It doesn't have to be that way.
It can really no longer
continue to be that way.
When I said earlier that the medical
community is failing Black mothers,
some may have wondered if I'm painting
with too broad a brush.
After all, it's individuals who are
to blame here, right?
Or perhaps we should say
that a relative handful of hospitals,
which happen to be the ones
that are largely used by Black women
and other minorities,
are at the epicenter of maternal
mortality in America.
But I would argue that focusing
on a handful of individuals
or a handful of hospitals
is defining the problem way too narrowly.
The problem behavior isn't about
the actions of specific individuals
or hospitals,
it's much more systemic than that.
What's more,
the prevalence of the problem
is deeply entrenched --
embedded in the very foundation
of our health care system.
It is this broad-based failure
that continues to allow disparities
in maternal health and death,
which result in Black women
just like Shalon
dying at rates 300 percent higher
than white women.
It's been well documented,
year after year,
decade after decade,
generation after generation,
and nothing effective
has been done to fix it.
How do we fix it?
Is there a definitive answer
to eradicating disparities
in maternal mortality?
Well, improvements in data
accuracy are critical
but not nearly enough.
Algorithms, checklists, apps --
they all play an important role,
but they're no panacea either.
And I really can't emphasize enough
that implicit bias training
without explicit --
explicit measures of accountability
will make absolutely no difference at all.
It is time --
it is long past time
that leaders in the medical community
take steps to transform
the health care system status quo.
The first step must be acknowledging
that the inherent problem
in the health care system
is more than a problem;
it's a failure.
The next step requires
taking responsibility
and owning that failure.
But the most important step
is actively taking the necessary actions
to right the wrongs
created by that failure.
A wise woman once told me
if you want something different,
you have to do something different.
My daughter was committed
to doing something different.
Shalon was known as a woman
of great integrity
and high moral values.
When asked about her driving
principles in life,
she would respond,
"I see inequity wherever it exists.
I'm not afraid to call it by name
and I work hard to eliminate it.
I vow to create a better earth."
Shalon put those words into action
every day of her life.
Former Surgeon General
David Satcher once said,
"Leaders must care enough,
leaders much know enough,
leaders must be willing to do enough
and leaders must be willing
to persist until the work is done."
Shalon was such a leader.
Though there will never be
another leader like Shalon,
we can each persist
until the work is done.
Here's what I'm doing to persist until
the work to save Black mothers is done.
To get things started,
I joined forces with several
of Shalon's friends
and CDC colleagues.
We founded a nonprofit.
We're working hard to eliminate
preventable deaths among Black mothers.
And here's how we're doing it:
with action, action and more action.
We're engaging stakeholders
at every point of the public health
and health care spectrum.
We're actively working
with the legislative office.
We're promoting accountability
measures in postpartum bills
and we want them enshrined in the law.
We're embarking upon
a community-based research project
which will redefine quality
of medical care for Black women.
Ultimately, we will tilt more power
into the hands of Black women.
How are we going to do that?
By empowering Black women
and their birthing partners
to effectively counteract the bias
and racism they experience
at any given point during pregnancy,
childbirth and postpartum.
Look around you.
Each one of us in this room
has a circle of influence.
I invite you to consider how powerful
an impact we could make
if we focused that collective
influence on this problem,
on making a difference.
What if we, like Shalon,
acknowledged inequity
wherever it existed in our communities
and we weren't afraid to call it by name?
What if we were each committed
and passionate
about using the full range
of our resources
to eliminate that inequity?
Could we change things?
Could we really overturn
centuries of prejudice
and decades of bad practice?
I know we could.
I know we could
if we were focused on that issue,
if we focused that collective energy.
To quote Nelson Mandela,
"When people are determined
they can overcome anything.
But "action without vision --
it's only passing time.
Vision without action
is merely daydreaming.
But vision with action can truly
change the world."
Shalon's life was the perfect
embodiment of the vision.
Shalon's death is our call to action.
So today let's each of us vow
to do whatever we can.
Let us vow to right this wrong.
Let us vow to be a part of the solution
until Black women are no longer
marginalized and dying needlessly
in the health care system.
And like my daughter,
Dr. Shalon Maureen Irving,
let us each vow to create a better earth.
Thank you.
(Applause)