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MedSIN National Conference 2004United Kingdom: the power to improve health? |
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MedSIN National Conference 2004 > About This Conference About This Conference
ProgrammeFriday 22nd October20:00 Welcome Reception Saturday 23rd October 09:00 Welcome and Introduction 10:00 Plenary 1: ‘Unsustainable salvation fantasies or developing health care?’ - The impact of UK aid agencies on health care in developing countries. 12.00 Flexitime 14:00 Plenary 2: ‘Beyond aid. Our true impact on global health: arms, bombs, debts and cheap bananas?’ 16:00 Coffee 16:15 Small discussion groups 17:15 Conclusion of day Medsin administrative meeting Evening – Ceilidh Sunday 24th October 09:30 Welcome and coffee 10:00 Plenary: ‘Inequalities that kill: the UK health gap.’ 11:00 Coffee 11:15 Panel discussion: ‘Tackling health inequalities: perspectives on past failures and future solutions from current policy makers.’ 13:00 Flexitime 14:30 Student-led debate 15:30 Conclusion & Farewell Download the programme as a PDF (Adobe Acrobat) file. BackgroundThe world in which current health care students can look forward to working in is one of extreme health inequalities, both globally and within the UK. Statistics about such inequalities can become so familiar as to lose their meaning, but we should not forget the shocking reality that they describe. Consider the following two examples: In the developed regions of the world 1 in 2,800 women die during pregnancy; in the developing world this number is 1 in 61 women.1 This means that there are over half a million maternal deaths in the developing world each year; deaths of young women, deaths which leave children without parents, and deaths which are evidently nearly all preventable. Within the UK the inequalities that persist are no less shocking: UK children aged 0-15 from social class V are up to five times more likely to die from injury or poisoning than their social class I contemporaries.2 The training of health care professionals in the UK is of an exceptional standard, and equips students with the technical knowledge and skills that are used to treat disease. But disease is an end point in a process that occurs throughout a life-course in a wider physical, economic, social, psychological, and political environment. In the UK, power is exercised over people’s health in the form of decisions made at every level, from the individual to the state. The 2004 conference aims to widen the perspective of health care students on these factors that determine health, and build an understanding of how we might work to increase health as well as treat disease.
Decisions made in the UK impact on healthConsider the impact of the UK and its citizens on international health. Whether working as individuals, with NGOs, or with the UK government, UK citizens are active throughout the world attempting to ameliorate the health consequences of famine, conflict, underdevelopment and disaster. But what of the decisions that are made at home – for example the UK arms trade, agricultural policy, ‘brain drain’ of skilled workers from the developing world, or the UK role in global institutions? Whilst it is easy to distance oneself from the decisions taken at national level, as individual members of a democratic nation, we are all, at some level, complicit in them. Although potentially valuable contributions, charity and volunteering are not the only levers we can operate on the stage of international health.Within the UK, thanks to the NHS, we are spared the wide disparities in health care provision that exist globally. Why, then, do such vast and shocking inequalities in health status persist? We need to look to the determinants of health that lie outside the sphere of medicine, and consider that the decisions that affect health are substantively not health care decisions. As health care workers that in the future are to deal with the unequal health consequences of these determinants and decisions, it is appropriate that we concern ourselves with them, and aim to influence them for the better. Out of this awareness, concern and debate we can forge a role as advocates. We can make use of the democratic mechanisms available to us as individuals and the collective voice at our disposal. Ultimately, through this, we can have a positive impact on health inequalities.
Need for & timing of this conferenceSince it was established in 1997 MedSIN has quickly become one of the largest health care student bodies in the UK, demonstrating the interest of health care students in global health, and a desire to take practical action to work to improve health locally. We feel, however, that there is yet more potential to be unlocked within this group.Media reports and corporate market research tend to suggest that today’s students are careerist and insular, and that apathy - currently at an all time high - actually increases with time at university.3 If this is true, a large, dynamic, grass-roots network like MedSIN is well placed to confront such apathy. This conference aims to challenge health care students with the political realities of health. Previous MedSIN conferences have examined themes such as primary healthcare and health for all; deprivation and health; global trade and health; international health in UK medical education; and human rights and health. The 2004 conference ‘United Kingdom: the power to improve health?’ will build on these previous conferences. For example, a natural extension of a human rights approach to health is to think beyond charity and instead consider our responsibilities as citizens to confront health inequalities. Sadly, health inequality is a very local and resonant issue in Scotland and in Glasgow. Seven of the ten ‘worst health’ parliamentary constituencies in the UK are in Glasgow.4 But this shocking reality has stimulated innovation on the part of local actors in health and resulted in a distinctive policy approach to health in Scotland. Ministers of the Scottish Parliament are demanding ‘long-term’ and ‘radical’ solutions.5 There are lessons to be learnt from the Scottish experience of facing up to health inequalities.
1 Maternal Mortality in 2000: Estimates developed by WHO, UNICEF and UNFPA. http://www.who.int/reproductive-health/publications/maternal_mortality_2000/maternal_mortality_2000.pdf 2 White D, Raeside R, Barker D. Road accidents and children living in disadvantaged areas: a literature revue. Scottish Execuitive Central Research Unit, Edinburgh, 2000. http://www.scotland.gov.uk/cru/kd01/blue/r-acc07.htm 3 Harding T. Most students to shun poll. Daily Telegraph 13th April 2001. 4 Shaw M, Dorling D, Gordon D, Davey-Smith G. The Widening Gap: Health Inequalities and Policy in Britain. The Policy Press, Bristol, 1999. 5 Poorer Scottish men ‘die younger’. BBC News http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/3540781.stm accessed 12 March 2004. |