Dr. Noa Emmett Aluli receives the Kulaia community award in September 2020. Aluli, who died last week at age 78, was remembered by family, friends and colleagues as someone who was passionate about the health of the Native Hawaiian community and a leader in the fight to protect Kahoolawe. — Photo courtesy of Davianna Pomaika‘i McGregor
Living by the motto of “the health of the land, is the health of our people, is the health of our nation,” Native Hawaiian doctor, activist and mentor Dr. Noa Emmett Auwae Aluli left behind a legacy filled with a passion for culture, health, conservation and education.
Before his death at the age of 78 last week on Molokai, Aluli shared his wisdom and dreams with thousands of future stewards. Lifelong partner Davianna Pomaika’i McGregor told The Maui News on Wednesday afternoon that he was always a nurturer and envisioned the islands flourishing once more.
“Everyone speaks of him as a gentle, kind, generous, Native Hawaiian healer and leader, very humble, but very influential, and someone who will be revered, modeled,” McGregor said. “Anyone he came into touch with, he had a very special relationship. Everyone felt like he really saw them and cared for them, so I think he will be modeled — compassionate, humble, caring, generous, leadership and kindness will be modeled by those he mentored and by those lives he influenced.”
Hearing stories this past week has shown her “how greatly he was loved and how much he’ll be missed.”
“What has impressed me the most since his passing on Molokai was how deeply the community loved him. His patients really loved him very deeply because they felt that he loved them very deeply and he did,” she said. “He really dedicated his life to his patients on Molokai, and not just the patients, but the kupuna, their ohana, their families and the people he knew.”
Lifelong partners Davianna Pomaika‘i McGregor and Dr. Noa Emmett Aluli are all smiles in Hakiowa in June. — Photo courtesy of Davianna Pomaika‘i McGregor
PASSION FOR HEALTH
Born on Oahu in 1944, Aluli was raised in Kailua and graduated from St. Louis High School. He later attended Marquette University in Wisconsin and was then in the first class of medical doctors from the University of Hawaii John A. Burns School of Medicine.
After a family health residency on Molokai in 1975, Aluli began a 46-year private practice at the Molokai Family Health Center in 1976.
It was around this time in the 1970s that McGregor met him, 32 years ago, while working on Molokai and Kahoolawe issues. She eventually became the organizational force, writer and researcher behind their future projects.
“We were both in it together and as passionate about the aina, and the health and well-being of Native Hawaiians, and Hawaiian rights,” said McGregor, also a professor and founding member of the Ethnic Studies Department at UH-Manoa. “It was through our work that we grew to love and respect each other.”
Dr. Noa Emmett Aluli speaks at the blessing of the Namakapili traditional hale in Hakiowa in November 2009. — Photo courtesy of Davianna Pomaika‘i McGregor
She shared how Aluli is known for pioneering a Native Hawaiian approach to health care in rural Hawaiian communities that he modeled for medical students that he mentored.
He emphasized specialized care of kupuna, even making home visits. Filling a desperate need, he facilitated the opening of the Molokai Dialysis Center, raised $17 million to upgrade the trauma unit and installed a CAT scan machine at Molokai General Hospital to better serve the island.
To address excessive rates of diabetes, heart disease and obesity on Molokai, he turned to the kupuna who helped develop a traditional foods diet from the land that effectively reduced the risk factors of those who participated in the Molokai Heart Study, McGregor said.
As a result of the study, Aluli’s Molokai patients improved their nutrition and shared the importance of traditional Hawaiian food diets spread to other communities in Hawaii, such Waianae.
He also initiated community-based participatory research on Molokai and laid the groundwork for indigenous health data sovereignty in Hawaii, McGregor said.
As the McGregor and Aluli family mourn the recent passing of “Uncle Emmett,” they shared several statements highlighting his lifetime commitment to Hawaiian culture, the community and the land.
“Dr. Aluli touched the hearts of thousands with his generosity, kindness, and aloha,” the statement said. “He inspired generations of Hawaiians to stand up and be heard. A new generation is stepping up to lead the ‘Ohana. He now leaves a big gap in health care for the island of Molokai that can hopefully be filled from among those he mentored.”
The family added in their statement on Saturday that he always took a holistic approach to medicine, believing that “the health and wellbeing of each patient needed to be understood in the context of their ohana, their genealogy, their lifestyle, and their ‘aina.”
These passions led him to help draft federal legislation that set up the Native Health Care System Improvement Act that was signed into law in 1988 to promote health and disease prevention services to improve the health status of Native Hawaiians.
He is also the co-founder of Na Pu’uwai, the Native Hawaiian Health Care System that serves Molokai and Lanai.
Seeing the need to create professional support networks, the small-town doctor helped to found the Ahahui O Na Kauka (Native Hawaiian Physicians Association), which is also part of the international Pacific Region Indigenous Doctors Congress.
PROTECTING THE LAND
Aluli also worked to protect the traditional Hawaiian subsistence way of life by organizing for access rights through Molokai Ranch to the ocean and played a crucial role in the Trust for Public Land that led to the conservation of properties in East Maui, for example.
A group called Hui Ala Loa, with the help of Aluli, also stopped the development of the landmark Kaiaka Rock, a fishing shrine and houses at Kawakiunui, village complexes, a sanctuary at Kawela and the Pukoo fishpond on the East end of Molokai.
Over the years, he could be seen protecting iwi kupuna burial grounds and forest reserves, drafting legislation that perpetuated Native Hawaiian rights, conserving water for subsistence farming and fishing across Maui County, and training Native Hawaiian physicians to provide care for local people, McGregor said.
Most notably, Aluli was part of the “Kahoolawe Nine,” the first group of people who stood up against the U.S. Navy’s bombing of Kahoolawe by landing on the island in protest. He was a catalyst in sparking the Aloha Aina movement that stopped 50 years of military training exercises that destroyed the island.
His legacy marked “a historic turning point” for Native Hawaiians and Hawaii, McGregor said.
The activists formed the Protect Kaho’olawe ‘Ohana that helped stopped the decades of bombing of the islands. Following this advocacy, Aluli served on the congressional Kaho’olawe Island Conveyance Commission, which asked that the island be returned to the people of Hawaii in May 1994. The U.S. Navy conducted a massive cleanup of unexploded ordnances on the island.
With the spiritual guidance of the Edith Kanaka’ole Foundation, Aluli and the Protect Kaho’olawe ‘Ohana revived Native Hawaiian cultural and spiritual practices and ceremonies, including the annual Makahiki ceremony which is now celebrated throughout the islands, McGregor said.
“The entire Protect Kaho’olawe ‘Ohana honors the life and visionary legacy of our beloved leader, chief defender, Mo’o Lono, policy advisor, doctor, mentor and lifelong friend, Dr. ‘Kauka’ Noa Emmett Auwae Aluli,” the organization said in a news release on Friday evening. “Kauka served our people tirelessly with love, aloha, humility, and kindness. A gentle and great leader of Kanaka ‘Oiwi for Aloha ‘Aina — loving, respecting, and advocating for our health, lands, rights, and religion.”
LEGACY LIVES ON
On Tuesday evening, families, friends and colleagues came together for a traditional Hawaiian ceremony to bid their final aloha for “Uncle Emmett” at the Oahu Mortuary, which was “the most beautiful gathering,” McGregor said. He was cremated on Wednesday morning.
“Most people celebrate a life, but we’re celebrating more than that, we’re celebrating his legacy, his visionary legacy for generations,” she said.
According to the family’s statement, Aluli once said: “We commit for generations, not just for careers. We set things up now so that they’ll be carried on. We look ahead together so that many of us share the same vision and dream. To our next generations we say, Go with the spirit. Take the challenge. Learn something. Give back.”
* Dakota Grossman can be reached at dgrossman@mauinews.com.
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