CommonSpirit Health supports survivors of human trafficking
January is recognized as Human Trafficking Awareness Month in the United States. It is a time to raise awareness about the ongoing issue of human trafficking and to educate the public on the signs, risks and ways to combat this severe human rights violation. The National Human Trafficking Hotline (operated by Polaris) reported over 10,000 cases of human trafficking in the United States in 2021 alone.
Supported by donations to CommonSpirit Health Foundation, CommonSpirit is a national leader in providing Violence Prevention and Human Trafficking Response Programs. Holly Gibbs, System Director, CommonSpirit Health Human Trafficking Response Program recently published an article about the life-saving work that philanthropy makes possible.
Surviving the streets
Angelíca Zuniga is a survivor of child abuse, human trafficking and intimate partner violence. She recounts a significant encounter in 2013 that changed the trajectory of her life forever. While in a trafficking situation one night, law enforcement approached Zuniga after spotting her out in an area they were patrolling. They soon realized that she needed help.
"I remember telling them to just take me to jail," Zuniga recalls. "I was so tired, so broken. I didn't want to live that life anymore; I just wanted to get off the streets."
Instead of taking her to jail, the officers took her to Dignity Health–Mercy Hospital Downtown in Bakersfield, California. Her health care needs were addressed, and she was later introduced to on-site advocates from a program now known as the Open Door Network. With her consent, advocates assisted in finding her a safe place to stay at the Women's Center-High Desert, where she also attended counseling.
Zuniga received ongoing support and services, including professional career development, from the Kern Coalition Against Human Trafficking and its member organizations in the following years, and credits the collaboration of community partners as a significant part of her healing. The continuum of care in the region made a difference to her.
Human Trafficking Response Program
The program equips physicians, advanced practice providers and staff to identify and assist patients who may be experiencing any type of abuse, neglect or violence, including human trafficking.
Efforts that began with Dignity Health and are bolstered through the expansion into the wider CommonSpirirt Health system include the hospital-based Human Trafficking Task Forces, led by senior nurse executives. They use a framework rooted in social support theory. The goal is for each multidisciplinary task force team to support colleagues and peers with informational, instrumental, appraisal and emotional support.
Support through grants
In 2018, the system’s national foundation (CommonSpirit Health Foundation today) was awarded a federal grant of more than $940,000 from the Office for Victims of Crime, a part of the U.S. Department of Justice, to expand on and evaluate human trafficking response efforts in Kern County, California. This included efforts to strengthen partnerships with local organizations and advocates, including survivors of abuse and trafficking, and to strengthen the region's collective community capacity to support the physical and emotional needs of people experiencing abuse, neglect and violence, with a special emphasis on both labor trafficking and sex trafficking.
Insights of program
To help measure the impact of these grant-funded efforts, CommonSpirit entered into a contract with Arizona State University's Office of Sex Trafficking Intervention Research. In October 2019, representatives from this office interviewed leaders from six member organizations from the Kern Coalition Against Human Trafficking.
The participants provided recommendations regarding policies and procedures for hospital systems considering the creation of a human trafficking response program. Those involved in this process made multiple recommendations, and CHA members can learn more by downloading CommonSpirit's Human Trafficking Response Program's Shared Learnings Manual.
Zuniga helps others
CommonSpirit's human trafficking response efforts would not be possible without the commitment, strength and support of survivors like Zuniga sharing their insights, allowing us to also help others. Zuniga has been a key part of projects against child abuse and human trafficking, among them serving as the chief executive officer for Redeemed Home, a safe haven for women in Bakersfield. She also provides supportive services to high-risk and adjudicated youth in Kern County as a survivor leader with the Kern County Department of Human Services. She is a community leader, wife, mother and grandmother who loves to be surrounded by her family, including her dachshund pups.
Note: This story is an excerpt of the article titled “Fine-Tuning a Regional Response to Aid Human Trafficking Survivors,” authored by Holly Gibbs and originally published in the fall 2024 issue of Health Progress, the Journal of the Catholic Health Association of the United States. View the original article here.
Learn more about support efforts like this with a gift to CommonSpirit Health Foundation's Violence Prevention and
Human Trafficking Response.
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About CommonSpirit Health Foundation
As the philanthropic arm of one of the nation's largest health systems, CommonSpirit Health Foundation is committed to advancing health equity. The foundation inspires investments and donations from individuals, private foundations, corporate foundations and other entities — to support programs and initiatives that address the root causes of poor health and enable all people to be healthy and safe. Learn more at CommonSpiritHealthPhilanthropy.org/Foundation.
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