Rawiri McKree Jansen
Ngāti Hinerangi, Ngāti Raukawa
Dr Rawiri McKree Jansen's mahi in hauora Māori, at both grassroots and national levels, speaks volumes about his passion for improving equity within New Zealand's health system. He focuses on providing clinical leadership towards Māori health equity as a General Practitioner and Chief Medical Officer for Te Aka Whai Ora (Māori Health Authority).
Formerly a resource teacher of the Māori language, Rawiri completed his medical training at Middlemore Hospital in South Auckland in 2000. For several years, he provided clinical teaching, Te Reo and tikanga Māori programmes for Māori health professionals throughout the country. Rawiri's expertise includes communication services for underserved and vulnerable populations.
As well as having medical training, Rawiri looks at factors outside of the medical centre that can contribute to better health for Māori, including housing, income, education and risk factors. For example, his work looks at how changes to equity in housing and overcrowding issues could significantly contribute to people's well-being.
Te Ahi Kaa - The fight for racial justice in health care
Māori experience worse health outcomes than the wider population in Aotearoa - shorter life expectancy, higher mortality and morbidity rates for a range of diseases. To ensure a health system that responds to the aspirations and needs of Māori we are charged with driving transformational change in the healthcare system. The way we have been working for the last few decades has not significantly improved Māori health outcomes. It is clear we need to do things differently. We need to embed tino rangatiratanga and we need to address racism –and colonisation including social, economic, cultural and historical impacts. This session will be informed by front-line insight of the fight for racial justice in health care – from community experience and collective action, to the academy, health policy and system reforms. The panel will describe the challenges and challenge the descriptions.
