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STAT+: For Google, health equity becomes ‘health optimization’ as Trump targets DEI
Google recently revised its websites and changed a senior executive's title to downplay its commitment to health equity.
Google recently revised websites and made other adjustments to downplay its commitment to health equity, the latest example of a prominent company repositioning its work following President Trump’s attack on diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Google has for years touted its efforts to advance health equity, but since January, the company began making changes to its health website to remove the term and other language around the idea of addressing social, economic, and other factors that contribute to disparities in health outcomes for different population groups. A STAT review showed that the company’s “health equity” page has been retitled “health optimization” and the company’s global head of health equity, Heather Cole-Lewis, has a new title: global head of health optimization.
Earlier, Google’s health website claimed that, “at our core is a dedication to diversity, equity, and inclusion,” but it now professes a dedication “to improving health for everyone, everywhere.” Previously, the company said it was “working to advance health equity and impact the drivers of structural and social determinants of health,” and now it is “working to impact the non-medical drivers of health.”
