Bita Amani, MD

Bita Amani is a social epidemiologist whose teaching and research focus on the synergies and tensions between community health, racism, politics, and power. With over fifteen years of experience in both local and global settings, her work investigates how social disinvestment and state-sanctioned violence result in disease and public health crisis. She prioritizes solutions that strengthen our existing community health infrastructure, and she examines alternative models of community care, such as the Cuban Health System. She is an Associate Professor at Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science (CDU), and lead co-chair of the UCLA/CDU COVID-19 Racism and Equity Task Force housed in the UCLA Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice, and Health. She is also Co-Director of CDU’s Black Maternal Health Center of Excellence. She is a former board member of Youth Justice Coalition, a founding board member of Frontline Wellness Network, and a Steering Committee member of the African American and Infant Maternal Mortality (AAIMM) of Los Angeles County Department of Public Health. Bita is a graduate of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, and she was a National Institutes of Mental Health (NIMH) HIV/AIDS Postdoctoral Scholar.