Blog by Emma Sheppard There is a lot in media about Long Covid—and in particular about the big concerns about how living with Long Covid must be awful. This fear of Long Covid is shaped by ableism, but that same ableism—and how we talk about Long Covid—impacts people already living with chronic illnesses that have […]
Category: Blog
How Do We Prioritize Needs Before “Needaches” in an Unequal World?
Blog by Gabriella Nilsson and Susanne Lundin At the backdrop of high-income countries’ hoarding anti-COVID-19 vaccines, let us problematize how the “needaches” of individuals in high-income countries are satisfied at the expense of the health and wellbeing of individuals in lower-income countries. While the health inequality gap is well known, and a basic premise of […]
Heart Failure Matters
Khalid Ali, film, and media correspondent reports on the British Society for Heart Failure ‘F Campaign’ Raising Awareness about Heart Failure in the UK Heart failure (HF) is an insidious condition characterised by symptoms of Fighting for breath, Fatigue and Fluid build-up, most noticeable in the ankles. There are approximately 1 million people with heart […]
This American Life
Blog by Allison Ruff I started listening to This American Life, a weekly, slice-of-life radio program and podcast, when I was thirteen. It’s the soundtrack to my early-morning car rides into the clinic, my afternoons running to the medical school to teach, and my evenings attempting a quick workout before putting my kids to bed. […]
Representing Epistemic Injustice
Blog by Sarah Marie Graye It is said that knowledge is power. So what happens when the knowledge of your own body is ignored or dismissed? This is how I felt when I was told I had asthma and I knew something else was going on. Eventually, I ended up in hospital having emergency […]
Remembering Anatomy Lessons in an Immigration Detention Center
Blog by Sarah MacLean In medical school, we learn what can go wrong in the human body. We also learn, though, that we’re essentially all the same. From DNA to macro anatomy, we’re all made of the same stuff, and that’s why we’re able to study medicine in the first place. After two months of […]
Access to Covid Protection Among the Swedish Public—Who Has It and What They Get: Lessons Learned from Ongoing Research
Blog by Rui Liu, Susanne Lundin, Talieh Mirsalehi and Margareta Troein Already in early spring 2020, Interpol reported that large amounts of falsified Covid-19 protection devices were in circulation.1 Now, in the beginning of 2021, the global spread of unapproved Covid-19 medicines – including vaccines – is on the rise.2 As our multi-disciplinary research group […]
That Which Cannot Be Seen Must Be Heard: Testimonial Injustice and Narrative Humility
Blog by Leah Teresa Rosen “Invisible illnesses”—like chronic pain, fibromyalgia, and other conditions that cannot be reliably measured or quantified—present a unique challenge to clinicians and caretakers alike. In American culture, we operate under the idea that seeing is believing, almost to a fault. We should not have to witness or experience something first-hand before […]
Beyond Physical and Psychological Health: Philosophical Health
Blog by Luis de Miranda We think we know what physical health and psychological health are, but what is philosophical health and why should it matter? The phrase “physical health” is nowadays considered self-evident. However, it became part of modern discourse only in the nineteenth century, along the publication of manuals such as Health Made […]
NHS in Critical Condition
Blog by Pam Kleinot Former journalist and psychotherapist, and producer of ‘Under the Knife’ (Directed by Susan Steinberg, UK 2019). I was inspired to produce ‘Under the Knife’ by my father, a doctor who worked at the largest state hospital in Southern Africa. He always told me how wonderful the NHS was. It is one […]