Tonight, 24th March 2021, BET is hosting a Zoom panel with the award-winning director and actress, Regina King, around skincare equity for skin of color.
The aim of this discussion is to highlight the healthcare and skincare inequities that negatively impact Black and Brown communities.
The reason this needs to happen?
Skin health needs to Black and Brown communities are continually misdiagnosed and therefore, without proper care can leave long term damage.
Over the past year, this has been highlighted several times including by actress, singer, and television personality Keke Palmer.
Palmer opened up (read here) about her struggles with finding the correct diagnosis for what she later discovered to be Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome.
She said “this especially makes me sad because my family struggled for years and no doctor could help them, they actually mislead them and just took their money.”
This is further supported by the industry as, nearly half of dermatologists say they were not adequately trained to treat skin of colour. Representation is also an issue in dermatological care with only 3% of practicing dermatologists identified as Black and 4.2% identified as Latinx (1).
This panel talk is a step in the right direction because the conversation is finally being started and the disadvantages that black and brown communities face are being addressed.
The event will be hosted by veteran beauty expert, Tai Beauchamp and Vaseline® spokesperson Regina King, along with other guests such as prominent doctors, experts and skincare enthusiasts.
It will give them a chance to discuss their experiences with inequity and the current inequities Black and Brown people face.
Also, the consequences of these disparities and the importance of properly treating Black and Brown skin will be an important topic tonight.
To expand this important conversation, BET and Vaseline® have worked together to create a video content series to further educate people around the issues of skincare inequity in addition to the Zoom event. The first video of the Equitable Skincare for All series will air on BET.com, and across BET’s social handles on March 18.
To register, consumers can visit BET.com and submit their questions ahead of the event using the #Skincareforall hashtag.
Find the link to attend here.
References
(1) AMA Dermatol. 2016;152(1):15-16. doi:10.1001/jamadermatol.2015.3030
