For more about CDF, go to www.cdfaction.org.
Lorrie L. King knows a thing or two about the challenges that many of the world’s people confront in getting even the most basic health care. For two decades, the public-health veteran has worked in Africa, South Asia and Latin America, particularly on behalf of girls and women.
Last March, CNN honored King as a visionary for her efforts to stamp out the stigma of menstruation in the developing world. These days, King mostly stays closer to home but her work and passion remain much the same. She is community health director at CDF Action. The community development nonprofit serves Clarkston, which means it also serves the sizable refugee population resettled there. King, a resident of Clarkston herself, talked to the AJC about her new role and how many of the issues in her community mirror those she encountered overseas.
Q: What drew you to public health?
A: It was predestined. I come from a long line of nurses and grew up reading medical journals like they were bedtime stories. The more far-flung the disease, the more fascinated I was. My first foray in working with refugees was through my best friend who is a doctor and the daughter of medical aid workers. She finagled it so that she could do part of her residency in her father’s clinic in northern Kenya.
Q: How did you wind up in Clarkston?
A: When we had our son, now 9, my husband wanted me to work less in conflict zones. We moved to Clarkston because we wanted our son to grow up in a very diverse place. Clarkston is the refugee resettlement hub for the Southeast.
Q: Do you get antsy in Clarkston?
A: I see enormous potential in Clarkston but yes, I do. Last year, I spent six weeks in Liberia doing field surveys and consulting with a group that wanted to set up a comprehensive menstrual hygiene management program.
Q: What are you trying to do at CDF?
A: The mission of our health program is to reduce health disparities and to make sure everyone has a medical home. I had been doing this kind of work in DeKalb before coming to CDF. I belong to what my husband calls the rogue social worker network. We all have our niche. I am the go-to person if someone has HIV and is in crisis.
Q: What is that like?
A: If there is anything more stigmatizing than mental health it is HIV, especially where most of our refugees come from these days. I found a community of women in Clarkston who were HIV positive through rape, warfare or genocide. If they came to the U.S. with a husband or male partner, they were ostracized because they were seen as the ones at fault. They don’t want to go to a clinic because they don’t want anyone to see them.
Q: How do you help?
A: I meet them in their home. I do some detective work to find out where the ball was dropped and what this person needs to get stabilized. Instead of waiting for the government to do something, I spring into action and am a strong advocate.
Q: How do health issues of the refugees here compare with the ones abroad?
A: The refugees might not be dealing with not having toilets or raw sewage in the street but they still have cycles of poverty that start all over again. By virtue by being a refugee, they have encountered some kind of trauma and those issues can pop up when they get here. The lack of services for mental health is consistent across the board, so is substance abuse and the marginalization of women.
Q: You sound discouraged. Why keep at it?
A: The work can be taxing but it is energizing. You really see the impact that you can have on someone’s life.
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