So you want to talk about race[1] and genetics?

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s declaration of racism as a public health concern is a step towards addressing health disparities and inequities in our society. The human genome project, launched 30 years ago, has transformed the way we think about ourselves as individuals and as a population. Several health informatics programs have successfully developed, distributed, and implemented genetics curricula into their programs ([2]; [3]). Yet race and genetics continue to be intertwined in complex and ambiguous ways which can present a challenge to the way we address and discuss issues around race and genetics with students.Therefore, health informatics students need a curriculum that 1) emphasizes that race is a social construct that is independent of genetics, 2) racism not race, lead to negative health impacts in communities of color and 3) epigenetics could be a primary channel that connects racism and genetics. Unlike genetics, epigenetics is a scientific study of how behavior and environment affect gene expression without altering DNA sequence [4]. Epigenetics evolved into describing how heritable traits could be due to changes in chemical modifications of DNA or of the structural and regulatory proteins bound to it. This highlights the importance of the environment and its effect on an organism and its stages of development. The UW MHIHIM program has included the topic of epigenetics into its Consumer and Population Health class for over three years, this has improved student discussions on distinguishing race, as a social and environmental construct, and genetics, as a biological feature. The inclusion of epigenetics has clarified how racism impacts a person’s and a population’s health.All of Us research which focuses on how biology, lifestyle and environment affect health [5] and the integration of precision medicine in public health, has urged us to comprehend the interplay among social, environmental, biological, and genetic drivers of health. Health informatics professionals will be asked to solve fundamental issues raised by this interplay to shape public health policies. Thus, epigenetics is the backbone upon which social determinants of health rest and dynamically shape the public’s health and would contribute greatly to health informatics programs when it comes to helping students better assess the population’s health and the underlying causes of a disease.