We at MEDICAL HUMANITIES welcome our readers to take part in Humanitarian Evidence Week 2018.

What is Humanitarian Evidence Aid? Evidence Aid was established as a charity in 2015. When disaster strikes, from fire to epidemics to famine, the difficulty isn’t just providing aid, it’s knowing how to provide aid effectively. It does no good if water and food don’t reach their targets, and poorly administered aid can also do harm. Evidence Aid uses knowledge from systematic reviews to provide reliable, up-to-date evidence on useful and practical interventions for natural disasters and other major healthcare emergencies. Evidence Aid seeks to highlight which interventions work, which don’t work, which need more research, and which, no matter how well meaning, might be harmful; and to provide this information to agencies and people planning for, or responding to, disasters.

What is HEW?

HEW2018 is an initiative led by Evidence Aid, in collaboration with the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, University of Oxford, to promote a more evidence-based approach together with many other organisations. During the HEW organisations provide webinars, blogs and debates to highlight topics related to generation, use and dissemination of evidence in the humanitarian sector. Look here for events and webinars, and to find out how to become involved.

What to expect this week:

Here at MH blog, we plan to host some of the corresponding blog posts and activities occurring during HEW. The #medicalhumanities and #healthhumanities promote social justice issues, and so also global health and outreach. Humanitarian relief, in the form of medicine and basic needs, naturally aligns with our attempts to engage culturally and to reach across boundaries. We look forward to sharing these posts, and encourage you to check out the resources at Evidence Aid for more. In addition, you might want to register for the following Webinar:

Finding the evidence for global and disaster health

November 19, 2018

A practical session (at 3.30pm GMT) from IFLA Evidence for Global and Disaster Health SIG led by Caroline De Brun, Public Health England, and Isla Kuhn, University of Cambridge. Details of a new resource guide will be included. Registration details here.