At preschool in Cambridge, MA, USA, during the early 1970s, Siobhan Wescott recalls
being attacked by her fellow classmates for being a Native American. “At 4, I physically
experienced racism for the first time. That really shaped my wanting to not have people
feel uncomfortable in new places just because of the colour of their skin or their
identity”, she says. Wescott, who is Alaskan Athabascan, became the inaugural Dr Susan
and Suzette LaFlesche Professor of American Indian Health and Director of the American
Indian Health Program in the College of Public Health at the University of Nebraska
Medical Center (UNMC), Omaha, NE, USA, in July, 2021. “Dr Susan was the first Native
American physician”, she tells me, but the LaFlesche sisters were “both very strong
public health advocates”. This position is a fitting one for Wescott, who says, “public
health is my passion”.