Working In Global Health: Fynn Crooks

Fynn Crooks first heard about Partners In Health (PIH) in 2014 when a college roommate started a chapter of PIH Engage—a grassroots network of community organizers—at their school and began hosting events to support global health in their home in Asheville, North Carolina. Fast forward a decade, and Crooks found their way back to PIH, this time as a member of the Advocacy team.

We chatted with Crooks, who is currently leading Engagers around the country from their home in Vermont, as part of our series Working In Global Health, which spotlights PIH staff who have dedicated their careers to making a global impact. During our conversation, we talked about how they were first connected to PIH, how their involvement has evolved over the years, and the similarities between participating in a choir and the global health movement.

When did you join PIH?

I originally joined PIH in early 2020 as a part of the Community Tracing Collaborative (CTC) because I read a piece in the New York Times one night at about 3 A.M.—while I was helplessly doomscrolling about Covid—which struck a chord. The article talked about the collaboration between PIH and the Massachusetts State Government to respond to the virus in the U.S. The name Partners In Health rang a bell, but also the evidence-based community contact tracing approach to the outbreak really landed for me.  

I felt alone and adrift in my anxiety, and this organization seemed to be building a life raft. I wanted on.  

Joining PIH at that time meant that I had access to sound information about what was happening, it meant that I could learn from people who had responded to other outbreaks, and it gave me a way to access community—both my community of colleagues and also the community we were helping—these were all instant balms and served to give me direction at an otherwise terrifying time.  

A few months into my time at the CTC, I met a colleague who had gone to Sierra Leone in 2014 to respond to the Ebola outbreak there, and I realized why I had originally recognized the name PIH. I was actually briefly on a PIH Engage Team in 2014! It’s a long story, but one of my roommates was an MPH candidate at the time, and she and another friend started a chapter right as Ebola was hitting Sierra Leone. We held a few meetings at our house, I did some tabling with them at student events, and we sent fundraising letters to friends and family to combat the outbreak—where my future colleague was working on the ground! Like I said, long story, but that Engage team looked very different than the way more organized version I’ve come full circle to join in 2024.

What is your role with PIH now?

I found my way back to PIH as a member of the Advocacy team. My technical title is Senior Community Organizer for Advocacy at PIH Engage. That’s a lot of words to say that I get to work with Sam Kelts and Queeny Jose to lead our grassroots Engage network, which has grown to more than 80 teams spread out across the U.S. Most teams are affiliated with colleges and universities, but some are also based in major U.S. cities like Boston, Philadelphia, New York, and Cleveland.  

All of those teams represent a lot of constituent voices, and my job is to help chart the course for government advocacy.  

What are some important aspects of your work with the Engage network?

We teach Engage members how to reach out to their members of Congress in support of legislation that builds the right to health—like the Paul Farmer Memorial Resolution, the Community Healthcare Worker Access Act, or the End Tuberculosis Now Act—all of which have been recent focuses of our advocacy campaign. We also teach Engagers about the Appropriations process, which is proving to be extra relevant right now during federal funding cuts.  

Usually, Engagers hold congressional meetings to ask for funding for PEPFAR, the Global Fund (GFATM), and USAID programs. Those asks have proven especially difficult but incredibly timely and necessary this year. Part of my job is to craft the best messaging possible so that Engagers head into meetings feeling educated and able to, in turn, educate their elected officials.  

How have PIH's advocacy efforts responded to this year’s unique circumstances?

This year, it has proven difficult and has taken an incredible team effort to keep up with the news cycle, but that’s also where I’ve seen the most direct impact from our advocacy efforts. In one evening alone, during an emergency call-a-thon with Engagers, we made nearly 300 calls to members of Congress.  

Engagers have also built relationships with offices and their staffers, who they can call on when global health hits the news cycle, which is constant right now.  

Just this past week, I’ve gotten several emails from Engagers who sent news articles about global health spending, TB programming that’s being cut, and the negative impact that the current administration’s policies are having globally and in their own communities. One of our Boston City Engagers had his research funding cut; he sent a blistering email to his reps, and he got an immediate email back saying that they were listening. I see this back and forth in my job all the time—I get cc’d on every email that every Engager sends to a DC staff member to request a meeting or follow-up—and I see the relationships being built. And while it takes a great effort to move the needle, I can at least see that new staffers who previously didn’t know the acronym PEPFAR wasn’t a soda brand sure know what it stands for now, and their own constituents are concerned about it.  

How has PIH been important to you personally?

Finding PIH has been a little like finding my choir. I mean that both literally and figuratively. I spend a lot of time when I’m not at work singing with a really big community choir here in Brattleboro. That’s something I’ve always done—sung in choirs, though it always takes time to find the right one. Once, a friend of mine mentioned that singing is the only socially acceptable time that everyone can talk loudly all at once; if it were done anywhere else, it’d just be noise or disruptive.  

But in a choir, we can all be heard, and it becomes music. It’s also sort of wild what a choir can do together. One singer can only hold a note for so long—but a choir could go on holding one note forever just by breathing at different times. I think that’s remarkably relevant to this moment and to what we’re trying to do at PIH.  

We all have to breathe. We can’t sustainably hold on to this fight unless we do so together. If we all pick different times to breathe, we can keep fighting as long as it takes.  

Coming to PIH and to Engage has meant that I’m surrounded by a chorus of voices all fighting (singing?) for the right to health, and since there are so, so many voices in this choir, I know we’ll be heard, and I know we can hold this note for as long as it takes. That’s what gives me hope right now.