Oceania Healers Initiative program equips NH/PI trusted messengers with the tools to combat disease and early death through culturally effective interventions. Covid 19 devasted our communities who suffered six times the death rate and 12 times the hospitalization rate compared to other racial groups. In 2022 due to the work of Pasifika community healers, we became the most vaccinated community in Washington state. Our lessons: we need to continue to equip our healers with medical knowledge, couple the interventions with language & food access and provide continuous community learning spaces.

Umu & Talanoa

Umu & Talanoa is our programmatic strategy to wellness where we center our cultural foods "umu" in feeding our village while we open up space for "talanoa" with our doctors and who work with us to improve the health of our families. We work in partnership with Doctor Fuimaono and Dr. Sundar who have been instrumental in ensuring medical knowledge is digestible for our trusted messengers. We also offer health resources as a referral access point during Umu & Talanoa.