Medact

Medact Glasgow group meeting: June
2024-06-11 18:30 - 19:30 (Europe/London)
Medact Glasgow is a collective of healthcare workers, students and people from other related social disciplines. We organise around, learn about and share information on campaigns related to health justice.

Our current focus is on fighting fuel poverty. We are working alongside Fuel Poverty Action, who organise for affordable and sustainable energy and against the inadequate living conditions which are making people sick.

Our main meeting is in person (or you can join on Zoom) on the second Tuesday of each month – all are welcome! Please get in touch with us on glasgow@medact.org if you want to join our meetings or find out more, or subscribe to the mailing list:

Nuclear Weapons Group meeting: June
2024-06-17 18:00 - 19:30
Medact’s Nuclear Weapons Group represents the longest standing aspect of Medact’s work towards nuclear abolition, and to address war, armed violence and conflict as global threats to health.

We will meet to provide an update on our ongoing work, and discuss the current global political landscape as related to nuclear weapons and disarmament. Register below to receive the meeting link!

For more info or with questions, email Sarah: sarahlasoye@medact.org

Medact Movement Assembly
2024-06-18 18:30 - 20:00
Movement Assemblies (formerly “Group Check-in”) are a space for people active in Medact local or issue groups to connect, to share collective learning from our organising—the challenges and successes and how we can support each other to win in our struggle for health justice.

This Assembly will take place ONLINE on Zoom. The first part of the assembly will focus on sharing updates and learnings from across the Medact network. We will hear national campaign updates from:

Patients Not Passports

Peace and Security

Climate and Health

Economic Justice

We will then share updates from across local Medact groups—all are welcome! Each group being represented will spend two minutes sharing a few highlights and any challenges you’ve had over the last few months, and any plans you have coming up.

In the second half of the assembly, we will have a skill-share on organising. We’ll be exploring an example together; how we can apply these learnings in our contexts; and the skills, knowledge and resources we need to put them into practice.

If you have any questions or would like to chat through anything, do get in touch with Ben Eder: beneder@medact.org

London Housing & Health meeting
2024-06-27 18:45 - 20:30, 2024-07-25 18:45 - 20:30 | Medact, Pelican House, 144 Cambridge Heath Road, London, E1 5QJ
Medact’s Housing & Health Group is organising to improve policies for better access to secure and sustainable housing.

This includes working alongside local groups to support local campaigns, as well as demanding policy change on a national level for better support for social housing, community-owned housing stock and protections for renters.

In this meeting, you will be hearing from the members involved in our work, get updates on our local organising, and help us develop the next steps and identify potential campaigns in other boroughs.

You don’t have to be a regular member of the Economic Justice &Health group or a health worker to get involved – everyone is welcome.

Sign up to the Medact London email list to hear about all Housing & Health London Meetings! If you’re unable to attend meetings but keen to get involved or develop a local campaign, you can contact Jordi: jordilopezbotey@medact.org.

Register to attend!

Background

The housing system in the UK is broken. Currently, 1.6 million households are on social housing waiting lists and millions more are struggling to meet unaffordable rents in the private sector. One in five dwellings in England fail to meet decent standards for living, with disregard for basic health and safety measures all too common. Housing is not equitably distributed in the UK: poorer households, ethnic minority groups, the elderly and adults with disabilities are all more likely to live in low-quality, unsafe, insecure housing. Despite all of this, social and private rents are growing faster than the cost of living. Social housing stock is dwindling, yet there are around five times more empty homes in the country than households in need of housing.

As part of the health community, we see and care for the symptoms of an unjust economic system. We are united in struggle with friends and colleagues within and beyond the NHS in organising to end housing-related health inequalities.

You can read more in our booklet, The Public Health Case for Secure Housing.

Medact Bristol group meeting: July
2024-07-01 18:00 - 19:00
Medact Bristol is interested and engaged in local, national and international issues that affect public health. Since its creation, Medact Bristol has focused its efforts on campaigns on climate, environment and sustainability, divestment, and migrant access to healthcare. The group’s current focus is supporting Reclaim our Buses, a campaign in Bristol to bring buses back into public control. New members are welcome.

From Fuel Poverty to the Just Transition: How Health Workers Can Join the Fight to Win
2024-07-03 18:30 - 19:45
Our homes are making us sick, shortening lives and stealing children’s futures. Join us this July for two online gatherings, where we will learn about how and why our homes have become sites of illness, and the political solutions towards reclaiming the relationship between homes and health.

Millions of people in the UK live in homes that are cold, damp, and mouldy. We can’t afford our energy bills, our houses are poorly insulated, and our government continues to rely on dirty, expensive fossil fuels. While people get sick, energy and fossil fuel companies are raking in record profits.

Cold and damp homes cost thousands of lives every year. This is the direct result of political choices—putting profit for shareholders and landlords above everyone’s right to live in a safe, warm home.

We know the solutions. As our Public Health Case for a Green New Deal stated loud and clear: we need quality homes for all, fair access to energy, and a rapid just transition to cheap, renewable energy.

At this online gathering, we’ll hear from speakers on how fossil fuels are powering the crisis of cold and damp homes, how mass insulation of homes and reform of our energy system is central to a just transition, and how organising in solidarity with tenants and communities builds power to force change.

We’ll share the tools that you need to learn, pressure decision makers, and build the health voice alongside communities—fighting to win healthy homes for all.

Speakers at the event will include:

Simon from the End Fuel Poverty Coalition & Warm This Winter campaign—EFPC is a broad group of anti-poverty, environmental, health and housing charities, trade unions and campaigners

Stuart Bretherton from Fuel Poverty Action—which campaigns to protect people from fuel poverty. We challenge rip-off energy companies and unfair policies that leave people to endure cold homes. We take action for warm, well-insulated homes and clean and affordable energy, under the control of people and communities, not private companies

Representative from Living Rent—based in Scotland, Living Rent is a mass-membership organisation of low-middle income renters, working and fighting together to win concrete improvements to our daily lives and put political and economic power back where it belongs

Scott McAulay from Architects Climate Action Network (ACAN) and Anthropocene Architecture School

Dr Isobel Braithwaite, Medact member Public Health Doctor—currently doing research on Housing and Health, Isobel has worked as a medical doctor and on public health issues including climate change and extreme weather, air pollution and mental health

Homes should be a place of comfort, health and security. Instead, across the UK, homes have become sites of illness. They are rendered cold and damp by poor insulation and sky-high energy prices. They are insecure due to unaffordable rents, evictions, and poor-quality housing.

Cold, unaffordable and insecure homes are no accident. They are the symptoms of a political system that produces mass illness and deepens inequalities in both health and wealth. The root causes are political—and this means the solutions are too.

At these online gatherings, together we will gain the tools we need to take action as health workers. Join the fight to win healthy homes for all, as part of the wider struggles for climate, housing and economic justice.

In the run up to the general election & beyond we intend to get organised, fight for healthy homes, and win.

Medact Leeds group meeting: July
2024-07-04 19:30 - 20:30
The Leeds group come together monthly for meetings on the 6th of the month. Meetings are online mostly and sometimes in person! Medact Leeds are organising locally for climate and health justice as part of the Health for a Green New Deal network, and also taking action to end the hostile environment, campaigning for Patients Not Passports. All are welcome. Please sign up to the mailing list to join the group.

Securitisation of Health group meeting: July
2024-07-08 18:00 - 19:30
What is the securitisation of health?

A number of policing and counter-extremism measures are embedded by the government into UK health services, which at times require health workers to work closely with the police and other security agencies.

These measures risk undermining therapeutic relationships, confidentiality and trust in practitioners – as well as drawing health services and workers into becoming an arm of policing and counter-terror agencies.

Through research and campaigns, Medact aims to shift understandings of ‘security’, from typically “hard” measures (border enforcement, a punitive criminal justice system, counter-terror measures) and advocate for collective and human security, health and wellbeing. Read more about our work on Securitisation here.

About the group

The Securitisation of Health group is for health workers interested in working on these issues through campaigning, lobbying and research. New members are welcome!

If you have any questions or concerns about attending, please email our Campaign Lead Sarah Lasoye at sarahlasoye@medact.org.

This event will be held online on Zoom.

Medact Glasgow group meeting: July
2024-07-09 18:30 - 19:30

Unhealthy Liaisons - NHS Collaboration with Counter Terror Policing
2024-07-10 18:30 - 20:00
Join us as we launch a new briefing: ‘Unhealthy Liaisons: NHS Collaboration with the Counter Terrorism Clinical Consultancy Service (CTCSS)’, written by Professor Charlotte Heath-Kelly.

CT CCS is an NHS–police mental health team that evolved from the Vulnerability Support Hubs, which were exposed in the 2021 Medact report Racism, mental health and pre-crime policing. It raises serious concerns about the nature of medical cooperation with Counter Terrorism Policing.

We will reveal details about this worrying service, and be joined by a panel discussion with expert speakers on: the implications of this collaboration, harms of the securitisation of health, co-optation of health workers into counter-terror policing, and the encroachment of counter-terror policing in healthcare and public sector spaces.

We will also discuss how we can go about challenging these practices in the current political context, and as part of Medact’s work campaigning to end Prevent Duty in the NHS.

Panelists

Dr Charlotte Heath-Kelly is a Professor of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. She is currently completing a 5 year study, funded by the European Commission, investigating the different Prevention of Violent Extremism policies used by European nations. The focus is on the integration of healthcare professionals and pre-crime logics, or their absence, in European counterterrorism. Professor Heath-Kelly has published five books with Manchester University Press & Routledge, and more than 30 peer-reviewed articles in international academic journals.

Dr Layla Aitlhadj is the Director and Senior caseworker at Prevent Watch, an NGO that supports individuals who have been impacted by the Prevent duty. She has been directly involved with 300 of the 700+ cases that have been documented by Prevent Watch to date. She co-authored the People’s Review of Prevent and the Response to Shawcross report with Prof John Holmwood and has contributed to a number of articles, UN submissions and reports as an expert in Prevent.

Dr Tarek Younis is the Racial Justice Researcher at Healing Justice London and Senior Lecturer in Psychology at Middlesex University. He researches and writes on Islamophobia, racism in mental health and the politics of psychology. He teaches on the impact of culture, religion, globalisation, and security policies on mental health. As a registered clinical psychologist, he primarily attends to experiences of racism, Islamophobia, and state violence in his private practice. His book is called The Muslim, State and Mind: Psychology in Times of Islamophobia.

Nina Navid is the Racial Justice Campaigner at Amnesty International UK, focusing on counter-terrorism, policing and supporting activists to take anti-racist action. She has previously worked in Amnesty’s Government and Political Relations team, and as a Crisis & Tactical Campaigner. Prior to working at Amnesty, she worked for the Shadow Minister for Women & Equalities.

Jim Killock is Executive Director at Open Rights Group. Since joining Open Rights Group in January 2009, Jim has led campaigns against three strikes and the Digital Economy Act, the company Phorm and its plans to snoop on UK users, and against pervasive government Internet surveillance. He is working on data protection and privacy issues, as well as helping ORG to grow in size and breadth. In February 2024, ORG released a new report, Prevent and the Pre-Crime State: How unaccountable data sharing is harming a generation.

Event details

This is a hybrid event, so please indicate when registering whether you wish to attend online via Zoom or in-person at a venue in Shoreditch, East London. Deadline for in-person registration is July 8th. The venue is accessible and full details will be provided on registration.

Medact North East group meeting: July
2024-07-10 20:00 - 21:00
Medact North East are a collective of health workers and students based across the North East, from Northumberland to Newcastle to Middlesbrough!

Currently we are working on a climate justice campaign, supporting a grassroots group to win the fight against a large waste incinerator on Teesside, which would pollute the air of the local community as well as accelerating the climate crisis.

We are also exploring campaigns around migrant health justice issues through our new ‘Migrant Health’ group. This includes supporting No to Hassockfield which is fighting to shut down a women’s detention centre in County Durham.

The group meets monthly. Each meeting is facilitated by a different person and they welcome new members! The time is used to discuss current campaigns and anything else relevant. For more information or to join a meeting in-person, get in touch at northeast@medact.org. To attend online, register to receive the Zoom link.

Lakenheath Peace Camp
2024-07-15 00:00 - 2024-07-25 23:59 | RAF Lakenheath, Brandon Road, Lakenheath, Suffolk, IP27 9PS, United Kingdom
Lakenheath Alliance for Peace (LAP) is holding its major summer event, the Lakenheath Peace Camp, at USAF Lakenheath on Monday 15th July. The camp will continue until 25th July. There will be inside accommodation as well as camping nearby and a continuous presence at the base throughout.

To take part, please contact LAP, not Medact, using the link below.

Register for the Lakenheath Peace Camp

About RAF Lakenheath

RAF Lakenheath is home to the 48th Fighter Wing. The base is used by F-15E and 54 F-35A fighter/bombers.

Although the USAF can “neither confirm nor deny” the presence of nuclear weapons at RAF Lakenheath it is suspected that nuclear weapons were based there, possibly with the B-29 in the 1950s. Lakenheath has won a ‘nuclear safety award’ and in 2003 was part of a exercise Dimming Sun which simulated a USAF plane crashing with nuclear weapons on board.

It is believed that 110 B61 nuclear weapons were deployed at Lakenheath. However, these weapons were withdrawn by 2008.

Although there is no evidence that nuclear weapons are being moved to Lakenheath in the near future, facilities are being built to house them. The F-35A has been flight tested with the B61-12 thermonuclear bomb.

Lakenheath has been involved in a wide range of operations and prides itself as being to “get out the door”. After the Hamas attacks on the 7th October 2023, F-15Es from the Lakenheath landed at Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan on the 13 October 2023 to bolster US presence in the region. Read more.

Nuclear Weapons Group July meeting
2024-07-15 18:00 - 19:30

Homes for Health: The Public Health Case for Social Homes
2024-07-25 18:30 - 20:00
Join us for the second of our series of online gatherings to discuss together how health workers can join the fight for housing and health justice!

The so-called housing crisis makes the spaces in which we live damp, mouldy, insecure and impossible to afford. The housing system prevents vast numbers of families from simply feeling at home, and calling the place they live a place of safety. Austerity and the commodification of housing has turned the domestic into a site of illness, violence, precarity, insecurity, and in some cases death.

We need urgent political action to respond to the public health crisis that health workers are witnessing. This requires rethinking housing beyond commodification and taking action to reclaim it as a public health asset. We need to reclaim housing for health.

It will take a movement, with tenants, health workers and all sectors of society working together to shift the narrative and end the public health crisis in housing. Join us to get involved with the fight for healthy homes!

In this second online gathering, we will hear from speakers about how health workers are joining the fight for housing justice and how tenants and communities across the country are building power to force change.

Medact members Dr Abi Secker, Dr Amaran Uthayakumar-Cumarasamy and Dr Isobel Braithwaite

Adam Gabsi – chair of Inclusion London and Harrow Association of Disabled people. Adam is passionate about Disabled people receiving the justice they deserve and wants to use his position to the benefit of all Disabled people, London-wide and beyond.

Laura Vicinanza – leads Inclusion London’s strategic engagement with the Greater London Authority (GLA) and supports DDPOs with influencing local and national government policies.

Greater Manchester Tenants Union – a democratic, member-led union, working across the 10 boroughs of Greater Manchester. They organise and represent members in the private and social rented sector and fight for safe, secure and affordable housing for everyone

Dr Abi O’Connor (New Economics Foundation) – an urban sociologist whose expertise centres on understanding the relationship between urban governance, local politics and the (re)structuring of place, specifically focusing on the impact of this on communities and areas impacted by regional inequality. She has a keen interest in democratising knowledge through grassroots movements.

Based on London? Join us for an in-person watch party at the Medact office in Pelican House, Bethnal Green! Just let us know you’re joining in person in the form below!

Homes should be a place of comfort, health and security. Instead, across the UK, homes have become sites of illness. They are rendered cold and damp by poor insulation and sky-high energy prices. They are insecure due to unaffordable rents, evictions, and poor-quality housing.

Cold, unaffordable and insecure homes are no accident. They are the symptoms of a political system that produces mass illness and deepens inequalities in both health and wealth. The root causes are political—and this means the solutions are too.

At these online gatherings, together we will gain the tools we need to take action as health workers. Join the fight to win healthy homes for all, as part of the wider struggles for climate, housing and economic justice.

In the run up to the general election & beyond we intend to get organised, fight for healthy homes, and win.

Medact Leeds group meeting: August
2024-08-01 19:30 - 20:30

Medact Bristol group meeting: August
2024-08-05 18:00 - 19:00

Nuclear Weapons Group August meeting
2024-08-12 18:00 - 19:30

Medact Glasgow group meeting: August
2024-08-13 18:30 - 19:30

Medact North East group meeting: August
2024-08-14 20:00 - 21:00

Securitisation of Health group meeting: August
2024-08-21 18:00 - 19:30

Medact Bristol group meeting: September
2024-09-02 18:00 - 19:00

Climate & Health: Energy Justice campaign New Joiners meeting
2024-09-03 18:30 - 19:30
Medact’s Climate & Health Group is organising to improve policies to end the crisis of cold & damp homes and fuel poverty, and ensure our homes are not sites of illness.

This includes working alongside local groups to support local campaigns, as well as demanding policy change on a national level for better support for quality homes for all, energy justice & a rapid just transition away from fossil fuels.

The New Joiners meeting is a space to meet other Medact members and health workers interested in the intersections of climate, housing and energy justice. You have the opportunity to hear about:

Medact’s structure, mission and goals

History and function of the group

An overview of how we understand the roots causes of cold & damp homes & possible solutions

Current campaign and organising work

How to get involved!

If you’re looking for ways to contribute to affect meaningful change to one of the key climate justice issues in the UK. this is a great way to do it. You don’t have to be a regular member or a health worker to get involved—everyone is welcome

If you have any questions about attending, drop Maria, Climate Campaign lead, an email at mariacarvalho@medact.org

Medact Leeds group meeting: September
2024-09-05 19:30 - 20:30

Medact Glasgow group meeting: September
2024-09-10 18:30 - 19:30

Medact North East group meeting: September
2024-09-11 20:00 - 21:00
Medact North East are a collective of health workers and students based across the North East, from Northumberland to Newcastle to Middlesbrough!
Currently we are working on a climate justice campaign, supporting a grassroots group to win the fight against a large waste incinerator on Teesside, which would pollute the air of the local community as well as accelerating the climate crisis.
We are also exploring campaigns around migrant health justice issues through our new ‘Migrant Health’ group. This includes supporting No to Hassockfield which is fighting to shut down a women’s detention centre in County Durham.
The group meets monthly. Each meeting is facilitated by a different person and they welcome new members! The time is used to discuss current campaigns and anything else relevant. For more information or to join a meeting in-person, get in touch at northeast@medact.org. or subscribe below.

Join the fight for Healthy Homes: New joiners meeting
2024-09-12 18:30 - 19:45
The so-called housing crisis makes the spaces in which we live damp, mouldy, insecure and impossible to afford. The housing system prevents vast numbers of families from simply feeling at home, and calling the place they live a place of safety. Austerity and the commodification of housing has turned the domestic into a site of illness, violence, precarity, insecurity, and in some cases death.

We need urgent political action to respond to the public health crisis that health workers are witnessing. This requires rethinking housing beyond commodification and taking action to reclaim it as a public health asset. We need to reclaim housing for health.

It will take a movement, with tenants, health workers and all sectors of society working together to shift the narrative and end the public health crisis in housing. Join us to get involved with the fight for healthy homes!

In this meeting you’ll:

Find out about the group and our Housing and Health campaign

Understand what we understand by economic and health inequality,

Hear about ongoing projects and campaigns,

Learn how we can fight for housing justice

Hear from some of the people working in our different campaign areas, and

Explore the ways you can get involved

Nuclear Weapons Group September meeting
2024-09-16 18:00 - 19:30

Securitisation of Health group meeting: September
2024-09-18 18:00 - 19:30

AGM 2024 & Panel Discussion - Building solidarity movements and demanding health justice amid poly-crisis
2024-09-24 18:00 - 20:30
The AGM is our yearly opportunity to come together and explore the overall running of Medact and to bring together members old and new from the UK and beyond. In addition to essential governance matters, we’re excited this year to be hosting a panel discisson:

Panel

The panel discussion will be followed by our AGM, where you’ll hear about successes and reflections from the last year of work across the Medact movement, an update on our organisational finances, and have a chance to vote in Trustee elections.

Everyone is welcome to join the meeting, but you must be a member to vote. If you would like to get involved in running Medact, why not join as a member today?

Submitting motions

The deadline for motion submissions has passed.

Election of Trustees

The deadline for Trustee applications has passed.

Logistics

We are hosting this year’s AGM online via Zoom. Register to let us know you are coming below, and provide any access requirements you may have. We will share the agenda as soon as it is finalised.

Speaker bios

Chairs:

Anuj Kapilashrami is an interdisciplinary social scientist, academic activist, and Professor in Global Health Policy and Equity in the School of Health & Social Care, and chair of Medact’s Board. Her current work focuses on advancing an intersectional approach to examining health inequalities and structural determinants of health and well-being. She has long been involved in People’s Health Movement (PHM) in India and the UK, formerly as Chair of PHM Scotland where she led the first public hearing on social determination of mental health and the development of people’s health manifesto for Scotland.

Kamran Abbasi is a doctor, journalist, editor and broadcaster. Following five years in hospital medicine, working in various medical specialties such as psychiatry and cardiology, he moved into senior editorial roles at the British Medical Journal from 1997 to 2005. He returned to The BMJ in his role as executive editor for content, leading the journal’s strategic growth internationally, digitally, and in print. Kamran was made Editor in chief of the BMJ in December 2021.

Panelists:

Guppi Bola is a senior economic strategist, previous Interim-Director of Medact and formerly Chair of the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants. In 2020 she explored themes of planetary dysregulation, illness and oppression, and their intersections with the economy for Common Wealth using her 15 years of experience in climate and public health organising. More recently, she has spent the past five years establishing Decolonising Economics, alongside her partner in crime Noni Makuyana.

Rhiannon Mihranian is doctor, organiser, and researcher focused on health justice as a tool for radical systems change. Her work focuses on environmental justice, anti-colonialism, and re-imagining health systems.

Martin Drewry is CEO of Health Poverty Action (HPA) – an international NGO part of the People’s Health Movement, and ally of Medact. HPA works in 15 countries, with 400 staff mostly from the marginalised communities they serve. A background in Peace Studies, Martin played key roles in several large coalition campaigns.

Dr. Inga Blum is a neurologist from Hamburg, Germany currently specializing in family medicine. She joined IPPNW as a medical student with an interest in global health and justice and got involved in ICAN at its founding at the IPPNW World Congress in Helsinki in 2006. In her view the abolition of nuclear weapons is not only an urgent necessity because of the acute danger nuclear weapons pose for global survival but likewise a great chance to shift international security policies from being based on the threat of mutual annihilation to a human security system based on cooperation. Having witnessed the constant failure of disarmament conferences as a member of IPPNW Delegations she initiated a study on attitudes towards nuclear weapons among political decision-makers at the University of Hamburg. She has conducted numerous workshops and delivered speeches with a special focus on motivating the next generation to get active for nuclear disarmament and is active in promoting the Ban Treaty in Germany. She served on the board of the German section of IPPNW from 2013 to 2021 and has started the annual IPPNW Summer Camp to protest against the stationing of NATO nuclear weapons in Büchel, Rhineland-Palatinate.
