October 17, 2014
Brushing Up One Smile at a Time
Eighty percent of Jamaicans live in dental shortage areas. This past summer I interned with Brush Up Jamaica, joining the mission to improve oral health care, education and access in Kingston, Jamaica. The organization in its fieldwork component provides educational sessions and health fairs year round, but as of 2014 summer, we implemented a pilot program that will lead to a huge project. Tooth decay being the number one chronic childhood disease in the world can affect a child's ability to attend school, socialize, learn, sleep, eat, and to smile. To target this issue in Jamaica, as Brush Up Jamaica’s community development intern, co-facilitating the development and implementation of tooth brushing programs in primary schools, this became the first step in creating a sustainable oral health education, a simple cost effective program that would produce a great influence on the movement of oral health. Together the local community, international volunteers and government collaborated to brush up Jamaica’s smiles one at a time. In the course of this internship, I learned that social responsibility belongs to everyone. We, being the citizens of the world serve and support each other in many ways. This internship has fueled my desire to pursue my degree in Public Health with a concentration of Leadership and Management in order to share the importance of social responsibility one community at a time.
Explore the MHC Social Universe >