On a typical morning in Downtown Los Angeles, a woman walks out of the Capitol One Café with her $7 iced latte. She walks down the street and enters the glass, sleek doors of the Equinox, where eucalyptus towels and hot pilates await her.
Less than a mile away, thousands of homeless people and children huddle in tents for the 50 blocks that make up Skid Row.
Here, the Downtown LA divide exists. On one side of the street, you have the highest-end fitness boutiques and studios. On the other, you have one of the most significant homeless crises in the world. In this strangely juxtaposed landscape, the question arises of who truly has access to “wellness” — and who is left out?
“Wellness is about finding that balance between mind, body, and spirit,” the Club Pilates Downtown LA Manager, Anne Marie, said. “I think [accessibility] is a studio-to-studio situation. At our studio, we try to accommodate and help… My goal is always to find a way to make it more accessible to you and to find that path and option. However, overall, I do see where people feel frustrated or defeated regarding accessibility”.
To Anne Marie, accommodation means figuring out what monthly membership fits best in one’s budget. However, with a Club Pilates membership averaging around $250 a month, there is little room for price flexibility. In Los Angeles, the General Relief Program for homeless individuals temporarily provides $221 a month. Simply put, these “wellness” boutiques at these sticker prices are hardly accessible.
Wellness truly might mean clean water, shelter, and food. People in the zip code on Skid Row are in a constant state of fighting for survival in a cycle of vulnerability, poverty, and addiction, with inadequate access to mental and physical health services. Due to repetitive, systematic failure, people do not have basic human necessities, let alone the space to worry about hot yoga or probiotics.
“I think what we know about the distribution of resources is that there is a disparity in who has access to healthy food as there are food deserts in LA, depending on where you are at, you might not have access to healthy food or its expensive to purchase,” said USC Mindfulness Professor Martin Vitorino.
A couple blocks down, there is a 41,000-square-foot Whole Foods Market, a luxury grocery shop that prides itself on serving healthy, fresh ingredients, another key component of wellness. This creates a barrier to affordable and accessible ingredients in such an urbanized area.
Wellness is not accessible for those who need it the most. In Downtown LA, there are two different priorities within a mile radius. One is to thrive. The other is to survive.
According to Professor Vitorino, everyone can benefit from practicing wellness, but it is important to recognize privilege and determine who has access to these basic resources.
“And when you make that observation, there is something that does not sit right.”