Dr. Bernadette (Bernie) Lim, MD, MS is the Founder and Executive Director of the Freedom Community Clinic, a healing movement and clinic based in Oakland, CA that has brought Whole-Person Healing to 6000+ people in the Bay and beyond, prioritizing the healing of Black, Brown, and immigrant communities. She serves as the youngest faculty at San Francisco State’s Institute for Holistic Health Studies. In addition, Dr. Bernie also is the creator of the Woke WOC Docs Podcast, Freedom School for Intersectional Medicine and Health Justice, and part of the founding team of the Institute for Healing and Justice in Medicine. Dr. Bernie graduated from UCSF School of Medicine and earned her Master’s at UC Berkeley School of Public Health through the UC Berkeley-UCSF Joint Medical Program. She graduated from Harvard University in 2016 with cum laude honors, and went on to be a Fulbright-Nehru Scholar in India. In her work, Dr. Lim also practices and/or teaches intuitive herbalism, energy healing, meditation, and hatha yoga. She is a classically trained pianist of 25+ years, a DJ, farmer, and hula and salsa dancer. For her work, Dr. Bernie has received numerous honors, see her bio for more detailed information: https://www.drbernielim.com/bio

Dr. Brian Lonquich is a primary care physician. He is triple board-certified in Pediatric Emergency Medicine, Pediatrics, and Internal Medicine. A SoCal native, he was raised in the Santa Clarita Valley and went to UC Riverside for undergraduate studies in Spanish Literature and Biology. He then went onto graduate medical school from UCLA and completed an Internal Medicine-Pediatrics residency at UCLA before moving to Baylor/Texas Children's in Houston, TX to complete a Pediatric Emergency Medicine fellowship. While in Houston he worked with physician-scientists at NASA to creatively use existing equipment on the International Space Station to help with planning missions to The Moon and Mars. He moved back to Southern California after training to be closer to family.  Dr. Lonquich is passionate about global health equity and access, and has worked extensively in Latin America and Africa. He is fluent in Spanish. He is an ardent supporter of medical education and came back to UCLA to help deliver academic, evidence-based medicine to the Central Coast. 

Christa Barfield is the CEO of FarmerJawn Agriculture.  Christa is a health-care professional turned farmer and lifelong Philadelphia resident. It was 10 years into her career in health-care administration when her life led her to pursuing health and happiness in a more sustainable way. After a solo trip abroad in January 2018, she returned home inspired to connect with the land, plant life, and social issues that heavily impact Black and brown communities and all people’s perception of food. Her business is a reincarnation of her healthcare career with a focus on regeneration and nutrition security. Now with 128 acres across 3 counties in PA, she has built FarmerJawn with an equitable focus on Food is Medicine and she is leading conversations locally and internationally on how to take a Farm first approach to America’s relationship with food and health.

Wawa Gatheru is Kenyan-American climate activist and founder,  passionate about bringing empathetic and accessible climate communication to the mainstream.  Harnessing her academic background as a Rhodes Scholar and her work as a youth climate activist, Wawa’s life goal is to help create a climate movement made in the image of all of us. In 2019, Wawa was named the first Black person in history to receive the prestigious Rhodes, Truman and Udall scholarships for her environmental scholarship and activism.  She is the founder of Black Girl Environmentalist, a national organization dedicated to empowering Black girls, women and gender expansive people across the climate sector. She is an inaugural member of the National Environmental Youth Advisory Council of the US EPA, the first federal youth-led advisory board in US History. Wawa sits on boards and advisory councils for organizations such as EarthJustice and National Parks Conservation Association. These accolades are just highlights of the many projects Wawa is contributing to.

Sonya Gabrielian, MD, MPH, is a psychiatrist and health services researcher at the VA Greater Los Angeles and an Assistant Professor at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. At the VA, she is an investigator with the Center for the Study of Healthcare Innovation, Implementation, & Policy (CSHIIP) and the Mental Illness Research, Education, and Clinical Center (MIRECC). She is also an Affiliated Researcher at the National Center on Homelessness Among Veterans and a current Fellow with the Implementation Research Institute at the Washington University in St. Louis. Dr. Gabrielian’s research interests focus on improving housing retention and community functioning among homeless adults; she has a VA Career Development Award to use implementation approaches to improve housing acquisition and retention for homeless Veterans with serious mental illness. She is also a practicing psychiatrist in the VA’s homeless program.

In today's conversation we speak with Dr. Christopher Gardner, PhD is a nutrition scientist and Professor at Stanford, his research has been focused on investigating the potential health benefits of various dietary components or food patterns using randomized controlled trials. He has served on many committees for organizations such as the American Heart Association and the American Diabetes Association and has conducted and published dozens of human nutrition intervention trials. His ongoing trials involve examining the impact of dietary changes on the gut microbiome and inflammation/immune function. Current research interests include collaborating with chefs and dining operators as research partners in an effort to identify strategies to optimize the intersection of taste, health, environmental sustainability, and social justice in institutional food settings (e.g., universities, hospitals, worksites). 

Dr Ashley McClure, is a Seattle native who has been practicing outpatient internal medicine in Oakland, California since 2016. After becoming a mom in 2018, followed by the infamous Paradise Fire that fall, she realized that for this moment in history being a doctor isn't enough. She felt compelled to reorient her life around doing everything possible to help catalyze the transition to clean renewable energy in order to protect her daughter’s— and all our children’s futures. Since her climate awakening, she’s been collaborating with health colleagues to bring our trusted voices to climate solutions advocacy, including organizing in the medical community as a CMA and AMA alternate delegate and as a co-founder and now co-director of the California-based nonprofit Climate Health Now. She welcomes your reaching out if you’re inspired to link arms in activism and advocacy-- and she hopes you do-- together we can be powerful. Brenda Nuyen, MD is a comprehensive ophthalmologist at a private practice in Los Angeles, CA. She is currently on the Climate Health Now Statewide Leadership Team. Brenda was first introduced to climate and advocacy work through Climate Reality Project in 2020. She then discovered Climate Health Now as a way to merge her interests in both climate and health. Brenda is also on the Editorial Board of EyeSustain, a global coalition of eye societies, organizations, and ophthalmologists collaborating to make ophthalmic care and surgery more sustainable. She recently was part of the Climate Advocacy Lab's inaugural Climate + Health Peer Learning Circle cohort. Climate Health Now: https://climatehealthnow.org/

Dr. Jiaying Zhao (she/her/hers) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology and the Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability at University of British Columbia (UBC),  Canada Research Chair in Behavioural Sustainability, and UBC Sauder Distinguished Scholar. She received her PhD in Cognitive Psychology at Princeton University. She uses psychological principles to design behavioral solutions to address financial and environmental sustainability challenges. Specifically, she designs effective behavioral interventions to alleviate poverty, promote actions to mitigate climate change, increase recycling and composting rates, and encourage biodiversity conservation actions. Sources: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama-health-forum/fullarticle/2814253#:~:text=The%20recognition%20of%20climate%20change,of%20US%20greenhouse%20gas%20emissions. https://www.umanitoba.ca/media/Simpson_Mason_Godwin_2017.pdf Dr. Zhao lab: https://zhaolab.psych.ubc.ca/ TED TALK: https://www.ted.com/talks/jiaying_zhao_how_to_feng_shui_your_fridge_and_other_happy_climate_hacks

Dr. Manuel Pastor is a Distinguished Professor of Sociology and American Studies & Ethnicity at the University of Southern California. He currently directs the Equity Research Institute at USC. Dr. Pastor holds an economics Ph.D. from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and is the inaugural holder of the Turpanjian Chair in Civil Society and Social Change at USC. Dr. Pastor’s research has generally focused on issues of the economic, environmental and social conditions facing low-income urban communities – and the social movements seeking to change those realities. Pastor’s research has generally focused on issues of the economic, environmental and social conditions facing low-income urban communities – and the social movements seeking to change those realities. 2021 saw the publication of two new books, Solidarity Economics: Why Mutuality and Movements Matter (co-authored with Chris Benner) and South Central Dreams: Finding Home and Building Community in South L.A. (co-authored with Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo). His previous 2018 book, State of Resistance: What California’s Dizzying Descent and Remarkable Resurgence Means for America’s Future was lauded in a New York Times review as “concise, clear and convincing.” To read more about Dr. Pastor and his work: https://dornsife.usc.edu/eri/manuel-pastor/

In todays conversation, we chat with cofounder and CEO of digdeep.org, George McGraw. George founded DigDeep to help those communities in America build and manage their own water systems. They’ve brought clean, running water to thousands of families on the Navajo Nation, Appalachia, and Texas border colonias. DigDeep also conducted groundbreaking research, empowers communities to advocate for their rights, and teaches  Americans to use our resources more intelligently. George received his Masters in International Law and Conflict Management from the United Nations University for Peace. He’s a leading voice in social entrepreneurship, environmental justice, and water and co-authored the first national report on water access, Closing the Water Access Gap in the United States (2019). In this conversation, we talk about what the water access gap is, and why it is so important to have access to running water and sanitation. George explains how race and income impact communities' access to water. He explains the economic and health impact of the water access gap and how climate change is affecting access to water. He shares stories of how DigDeeps work is impacting people and how we can get involved in helping to ensure a fundamental human right for everyone, access to clean, running water.