*** Caution to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers: this article contains images of people who have passed ***
Human rights concerns – globally and locally – feature in the column this week. Read on to see if you recognise the Urgent Normal Syndrome, and also check out the latest news in global health, some media fails, and who is supporting a yes vote at The Voice referendum.
Scroll down to find out about new books that look interesting, as well as awards, opportunities and upcoming events – including a presentation by Professor Rob Moodie on “The insidious role of sugar in our way of life”.
The quotable:
We have an opportunity to learn from this pandemic and ensure antivirals for COVID-19 are at the forefront of a better health response and are used to reduce existing disparities in hospitalisation and death – not to further entrench them.”
Celebrating NAIDOC
NAIDOC Week, which starts on Sunday with the theme For Our Elders, “is a real celebration of all the wonderful things that we do in our communities, every day”, says Julie Tongs OAM, the CEO of the Winnunga Nimmityjah Aboriginal Health and Community Services, an Aboriginal community controlled primary health care service in Canberra. Read the Insight+ article here.
COVID
“Urgent Normal Syndrome” is defined by: an unhealthy attraction to crowded indoor spaces, anxiety at the sight of masks or air purifiers, an urge to downplay threats, and avoidance of “bad news”. Other signs include feeling an urge to mock or ridicule anyone who’s taking precautions or staying informed.
Sound familiar?
The Urgent Normal Syndrome has been expounded by writer and author Jessica Wildfire, who tweeted “Let’s gaslight the gaslighters”.
Statement by the British Heart Foundation: Nearly 100,000 more deaths involving heart conditions and stroke than usual since pandemic began
The authors of the MJA article conclude:
“Equity depends on continuing to address the structural inequalities within our health system that create barriers to people accessing primary health services and tailoring responses to communities…Equitable delivery of health care is a perpetual challenge. Better investment in general practice, community health and Aboriginal Controlled Community Health Services will assist to uphold equity in the response to COVID-19.
“If Australia reverts completely to a “business as usual model”, relying on stretched primary healthcare services with no additional resourcing (including addressing Medicare indexation as a matter of urgency), we will fail to reach the people likely to benefit from treatment. For millennia, pandemics have disproportionately affected those who are disadvantaged.
“We have an opportunity to learn from this pandemic and ensure antivirals for COVID-19 are at the forefront of a better health response and are used to reduce existing disparities in hospitalisation and death — not to further entrench them.”
Read the study in The Lancet Infectious Diseases
Global health
Action for climate
Read the report on a Just Transition.
It says: “Access by every citizen to nutritious, abundant, affordable and culturally appropriate food is a central objective of development. Africans can achieve food sovereignty by shifting away from export-oriented, cash-crop, industrial agriculture that has left Africa hungry towards community-based agro-ecological systems that provide nutritious food, sustained yields, secure livelihoods, and climate resilience.
“A second step is to escape the post-colonial trap of prioritising extractive industries…Africa has an unprecedented opportunity to leapfrog the dirty and obsolete energy systems of the past towards more modern, people-centred, decentralised renewable energy systems.
“Through the kinds of approaches outlined in this report, Africa can contribute to and inspire similar and much needed questioning of the mainstream development paradigm on other continents.
“The set of intertwined, existential crises all societies face – climate breakdown, biodiversity collapse, environmental destruction paired with increasing inequality, patriarchal oppression, social insecurity, and alienation – calls for a deep reset of the very meaning of ‘development’ and progress, everywhere.
“Conventional economic theory and its blind focus on economic growth and private sector profit maximisation as over-riding imperatives are clearly part of the root problems. Notions such as sufficiency and degrowth need to be honestly and seriously considered, particularly by wealthy, ‘over’ or ‘mal-developed’ societies.”
Human rights
The Voice
See the Law Council’s resources.
First Nations peoples and health
Public health and prevention
#AusPol
Read the article on Qld Health moves.
Media matters
#CroakeyREAD
Events, opportunities and awards
