FRESH Teens Talk About Public Health

Who’s Healthy?
by Evelyn Fernandez
Do you think that people living in places like Brownsville are healthier than people living in places like Fort Greene? Well I have explored this question. On our trip to the Department Of Health here in Brooklyn, me and the other Fresh Teens learned about the different things that people in low income homes go through. For example, there is a lower obesity rate in Fort Greene than in places like Brownsville.

On this trip we looked at a survey of the different things that go on in these neighborhoods, like if there are programs where people can work out for an affordable price, or if people in these neighborhoods are able to find fresh food where they live. Me and the other Fresh Teens made graphs about the different things happening in these neighborhoods. For example, I graphed the amount of daily exercise that people living in Fort Greene had vs. the amount of daily exercise people living in Brownsville had. The results were actually not surprising to me. Brownsville is a lower income community so it’s not really that hard to believe that people don’t have the money to spend on going to the gym and things like that.

We also talked about how we can make it better in these communities. We talked about putting in free programs where people can go and work out and learn about how to stay healthy. So the answer to my original question is no, people in Brownsville aren’t healthier then people living in Fort Greene as a whole. But hopefully these programs will motivate people to become more educated about affordable ways to stay fit and healthy.

Evelyn is participating in MARP's FRESH Teens program, joining 5 other teens from the neighborhood to learn about food issues and build leadership skills to engage other youth. FRESH Teens will be blogging throughout the rest of the program, which runs through the end of October.

For more information about the FRESH Teens program, please contact Sam at 718.230.1689 or sam@myrtleavenue.org.