Let’s talk about the Pasifika Medical Association (PMA) and their involvement in Moana Pasifika Rugby.
The minute the media reported Moana Pasifika was being backed by PMA, everyone lost their minds.
“What’s this got to do with health?”
“Is this what taxpayer money should be spent on?”
“What’s going on?”
Great clickbait. No context.
Moana Pasifika was never just a rugby team. It was a vehicle for connection. For identity. For belonging.
For a community sitting at the sharp end of some of the worst health outcomes in this country, you don’t separate health from culture. You build around it.
When the only images you see of yourself in the media are tied to heart disease, social housing and bad eating habits, is it any wonder the statistics are so bad?
But we still have the nerve to say, “What you put in is what you get out.”
The hypocrisy makes me feel ill.
In my experience, good health starts with how you see yourself. It’s about culture. It’s about self-esteem. It’s about belonging. It’s about having something to be proud of.
When those foundations aren’t there, hospital is where people end up.
That’s what Pasifika Medical Trust was tapping into. That’s upstream work. That’s prevention.
But instead of asking why a health organisation would support something like this, we went straight to outrage.
A health group backing its own people? They must be up to something dodgy.
That reaction says more about how narrow our thinking is than anything the Pasifika Medical Association was doing.
If we want better outcomes for our Pacific communities, we need to start treating people the way we want to be treated, not like the poor cousins who’ve somehow been labelled a burden on the taxpayer.
Moana Pasifika Rugby was the perfect example of how we treat Pasifika initiatives. With suspicion. With doubt. With a quiet expectation that they’ll fail.
Right from the start, they were treated like a burden. Set up to fail.
We made all the right noises. “This is what’s been needed. This is what Pasifika people deserve.”
All the while putting barriers in their way.
Of course, the cost of travel to Tonga, Fiji and Samoa was always going to be prohibitive. Not even our most financially secure teams in New Zealand could sustain that.
But that’s what was expected of them. It was even written into their contract that they could only play a handful of games at their New Zealand home, North Harbour Stadium.
How is that a level playing field?
If we want better outcomes in Pasifika health, the first thing we need to do is lift people up and remind them of their value. Not just to themselves, but to us as a nation.
Because if we continue to think health is just prescriptions and waiting lists, the poor outcomes for our Pacific communities will continue to rise.
Just like the chances we gave Moana Pasifika fell. Moana Pasifika was never about a rugby team trying to do health. It was a health initiative using rugby to lift its people.
And the Pasifika Medical Association should be applauded for that.
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