Joint Medical Program’s Daniel Woolridge wins Emerging Health-Activist Award

Congratulations to Dr. Daniel Woolridge, a pediatrician and clinical lecturer for the UC Berkeley-UCSF Joint Medical Program (JMP), has been awarded one of four Emerging Health-Activist awards from the San Francisco chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility.

“We are so excited and proud of Dr. Woolridge; he is immensely deserving of this award and we are glad to see his important work on antiracism in medicine being recognized,” said Dr. Jyothi Marbin, director of the Joint Medical Program.  As part of the JMP, Woolridge facilitates a core curriculum class on anti-racism and convenes a regular working group of faculty and staff at both UCB and UCSF to address injustices in medical information and practices.

Marbin, who nominated Woolridge for the award, called out how his work as a scientific advisor for the San Francisco Unified School District during its initiative to reopen schools after the COVID-19 pandemic led to his work initiating and planning a new Center for the Study of Medical Humanities and Scientometrics (scientometrics is the quantitative study of science, communication in science, and science policy).

While working with SFUSD, Woolridge witnessed how Black, indigenous, and peoples of color communities’ mistrust of institutions, including health care, adversely impacted their health behaviors. In addition, he saw first-hand the failure of these institutions to recognize, acknowledge, and address this mistrust.

Physicians for Social Responsibility wrote that In response, “Woolridge initiated the Center for the Study of Medical Humanities and Scientometrics to address the lack of access to credible scientific and medical knowledge in communities outside the university. As part of this initiative, he also co-created a lecture series—in conjunction with the UC Berkeley Othering and Belonging Institute—to offer medical and science lectures for the general public, called the Medical Humanities and Abolition Medicine series. Abolition medicine refers to the integration of antiracist principles into the structure of the entire health system–from its fund of knowledge to its personnel and practices.”

The Emerging Health-Activist awards are given to medical, public health, and health science students, postgraduate trainees, and early career professionals honoring work in three major areas of focus: nuclear abolition & peace, health equity & social justice, and environmental health.