Newsletter 163

Contents

Action of the Week

Defend Primary Healthcare - Write to your MP this week

The countdown to the publication of a government review on access to healthcare for vulnerable migrants has begun. Neil Gerrard MP has tabled an Early Day Motion (a statement of beliefs) in the Houses of Parliament " against any measures that would compel general practitioners, and other primary care staff, to be forced to charge refused asylum seekers or other vulnerable foreign nationals for NHS care." (EDM 220) If we can get 100 MPs to sign this EDM, the findings of the review will stand more chance of being debated. This means we will have more opportunity to push for changes.

So, IF YOU DO ONE POLITCAL THING THIS WEEK, go here, download the template letter to MPs, add your name, adapt it as you see fit and mail it to your MP. You can find out who your MP is by putting in your postcode here. Many thanks!

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National News and Events

Anything Else

Of the Month

Website and News

The website is for YOUR events being held by YOUR branches, projects and campaigns. It is really, really easy to submit events and news, so please do, and let everyone know what wonderful things you are up to! Join in Medsin discussions at http://www.medsin.org/discuss

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National News and Events

Not just any old Christmas Cards

Every year, many of you Christmas cards to send to family and friends. This year please help Medsin without spending any extra money, and buy your Christmas cards from www.studio51.com. We receive a ground-breaking 51p in every £1 you spend…..

Studio51 have a fabulous collection of high-quality cards at fair prices; starting at £3.99 for 20 and up to £6.50 for 10. The website is very easy to use: just select your cards, select Medsin as your chosen charity, pay online or by cheque and the cards will then be delivered to you by first class post within a few days.

Please, please support us by shopping here, and please pass this on to all your family and friends so they can support Medsin too.

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National Conference 2008 Applications

The bids are in and it's voting time. The applications to host the National Conference can be viewed here, and cast your votes by e-mailing VoteNow

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E-vote Results!

The E-vote last week results are... (drumroll please...) Motion passes! Many thanks to all who voted, Medsin can now sign the Climate Change Declaration. (available here)

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UAEM Talks

Universities Allied for Essential Medicines has a two-fold mission:

  • To determine how universities can help ensure that biomedical end products, such as drugs, are made more accessible in poor countries and
  • To increase the amount of research conducted on neglected diseases, or those diseases predominantly affecting people who are too poor to constitute a market attractive to private-sector R&D investment.

We are delighted to announce that on Monday 19th and Tuesday 20th November Ethan Guillen, Executive Director of UAEM, will be visiting the UK to talk about the work and success of UAEM in America, and how to start a UAEM chapter at your university.

Monday 19th November -
Where: University of Edinburgh, LT1 Appleton Tower, Main Campus. When: 7pm. Tuesday 20th November - Where: London (venue tbc). When: tbc.

For more information please visit us here or contact Vanessa.

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Control BAE Speaker Tour

  • Wed 28th Nov - Edinburgh
  • Thurs 29th Nov - Newcastle

The talks are organized by the Campaign against the Arms Trade" as part of their "Control BAE" campaign. This campaign is looking to expose some of the business dealings of this arms company and keep up the pressure on the Government to reopen the Serious Fraud Office enquiry into the massive Al-Yamamah arms deal with Saudi Arabia.

The talks will look at the impact of the arms trade and corruption on development and human rights.

Details of times and venues can be found here

If you are interested in getting involved in Medsin's Arms Trade campaign please let us know. Our address in armstrade@medsin.org

Nick and Jen Arms Trade Co-Ordinators

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SEXBALL - 24th November, Birmingham

Sexpression will be hosting an afternoon of great speakers on sexual and maternal health globally at Birmingham Medical School. We have speakers lined up to talk on everything from Female Genital Mutilation to HIV/AIDS.

This interesting afternoon will be followed by a evening of Sexpression fun! The evening starts with a champagne reception followed by 3 course dinner and disco. Dress code is black tie with a splash of red with World AIDS Day collections throughout the night.

Tickets are £35 for all of this. For more information or to buy your tickets contact Emily.

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Awesome Essential Medicines DVD!

The pièce de résistance of the Theme Team at the UK IFMSA conference was the DVD they produced (the culmination of over a year's work!), which includes two films and 5 Computer Assisted Learning kits. Find out more and get your copy for almost free (miniscule cost just covers P&P) here now!. Limited stock available

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Sponsoring a Parliamentary Meeting

Does anybody have any objections to Medsin being listed as a sponsor of a meeting in the Houses of Parliament? This simply shows our support for the meeting (which has similar aims to the Defend Primary Healthcare campaign) and would entail no financial cost to the organisation. Please email the committee with objections by the end of the week.

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Anything Else?

The following aren't officially affilliated with Medsin, but we thought you might be interested.

Cambridge International Development Course

Interested in international development? Want to advance your knowledge and understanding with help from top academics and professionals? The IDC is for you!

Welcoming participants from all disciplines and levels of experience, this single-day programme provides an introduction to issues in international development.

The programme includes lectures about the state of development with reference to the past, present and future of development thinking and practice. These lectures are complemented by a choice of interactive workshops, tackling specific issues such as the environment, poverty and inequality, humanitarian relief work, and global citizenship.

The December International Development Course promises to be both inspiring and challenging, while focusing on introducing the main areas that international development addresses. This is also the chance to interact and learn from development professionals whose daily work puts theory into practice. Not a day to miss!

Cambridge International Development Course Saturday 1st December 9.00am- 4.30pm, Law Faculty Booking is obligatory £8 (includes buffet lunch and refreshments)

For more information, and to book your place, go here

This event always SELLS OUT, to avoid disappointment book early.

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Conference Series: Climate Change and Health at the Royal Society of Medicine, London

There is now overwhelming evidence that global warming is rapidly progressing, and major climate changes are already being experienced in many parts of the world. This series of evening meetings at the Royal Society of Medicine aims to examine and forecast the effects on human health, with the intention of increasing awareness of the serious threat to our planet.

  • Monday 26 November 2007 - Action for the health consequences of climate change

5:45 pm – 8:00 pm

For more information and to register online please visit http://www.rsm.ac.uk/diar/diary.php or contact Sinem Gocmen. Tel: 020 7290 3856 fax: 020 7290 2989

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3rd Alma Mata Conference

Global Health Directions 3: Commercialisation and Health

Alma Mata Global Health Conference and International Health Careers Fair

Saturday 24th & 25th November 2007 UCL Institute of Child Health, London

Tickets are now available online for the third Alma Mata conference and International Health Careers Fair!

Interested in a career in global health? Join us for a weekend of world class speakers and workshops discussing major global health issues, followed by our first International Health Careers Fair. Please visit the conference website or see the medsin site for more details.

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Child Family Health International (www.cfhi.org)

Socially responsible, financially just, global health programs for Medical & other students of the health sciences in Bolivia, Ecuador, India, Mexico, Nicaragua and South Africa.

  • Choose from 17 program sites around the world.
  • Programs are 4 to 8 weeks long & run every month of the year.
  • Clinical rotations with local preceptors in a variety of settings
  • Housing with local home-stay families (guest houses where home-stays are not available)
  • Spanish language instruction (including Medical Spanish) in all Spanish-speaking programs
  • Fundraising resources (including scholarships) available
  • Academic credit arranged upon request

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MSc programmes, international public health policy

MSc in global health and public policy MSc in health inequalities and public policy MSc in health systems and public policy MSc in global health and anthropology

The MSc programmes offered by CIPHP for 2008-09 have a unique focus on public health policy in the context of widening global and domestic health inequalities.

The programmes provide students with an understanding of the significance of global changes such as social and economic inequalities and the promotion of free trade and economic growth by governments and international organisations. They equip them with the skills and knowledge to conduct public health research and advocacy in the new global context.

Great importance is placed on research methods and analytic techniques for practical application or for further research. The programmes are designed to be accessible to students from diverse backgrounds – including public health practitioners, policy makers, researchers, and NGO staff, and graduates in social science, science, medicine, nursing, and other related disciplines. They provide for specialisation in policy areas relevant to both UK and international interests.

The programmes take one year full-time and up to three years part-time. Possibilities exist for distance and modular learning.

http://www.health.ed.ac.uk/CIPHP/postgraduate/

For more information, contact:

Dr James Lancaster Centre for International Public Health Policy University of Edinburgh Medical Quad, Teviot Place Edinburgh EH8 9AG UK

0131 651 3963 james.lancaster@ed.ac.uk

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Buy Nothing Day on Saturday 24th November

There are loads of events going on all around the country - have a look and get involved!

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Of the Month

Campaign Focus: Stop AIDS

The first half of 2007 was a great time for the Stop AIDS Campaign. To keep it brief, the two main things that happened were:

  • At the training day in Birmingham back in February, we set up a nationwide steering committee made up of regional representatives, so that local groups could contribute more easily to the national campaign.
  • On March 20th, almost 100 students descended on Parliament (red t-shirts, infamous pill costumes and all) to lobby their MPs and the Secretary of State on the issue of access to treatment, specifically for Thailand who were trying (against much opposition from big pharma and elsewhere) to provide their citizens with more affordable treatment. The lobbying event was a huge success since the UK government subsequently spoke out in support of the Thai government, ultimately leading to the provision of medicines for 8000 more people in the country.

More recently, October saw the hugely successful ‘Unite to Fight AIDS’ Speaker Tour visiting 18 different universities in the UK. About 1500 students attended local events to listen to inspirational and moving talks on HIV/AIDS and activism from Ntenje Katota (19, Zambian), Shahada Kinyaga (24, Tanzanian), Will Horwitz (22, British), and Katy Athersuch (24, British). We also took the tour to Parliament, where we were welcomed by the All Party Parliamentary Group on AIDS. Here, the speakers were told by one MP (who had been working on HIV/AIDS for 20 years) that it was ‘the best presentation on AIDS’ he had ever seen. Unfortunately, despite the positive feedback only 3 MPs were present, and the Department for International Development (DFID) did not send a single representative. This signaled a worrying change in attitude from Brown’s new team, and presents a great challenge to campaigners for the coming year, especially in terms of lobbying MPs.

World AIDS Day, the biggest event on the Stop AIDS calendar, is coming up on December 1st. As always, it should be a fantastic day for raising awareness, having loads of fun, and getting our message across. If you’re stuck, we will soon be sending out packs with info and films etc that you can use if you want. In the meantime, please bear the following things in mind while planning your WAD events:

  • Stay informed: the briefing pack is a great resource to use, available at www.medsin.org/campaigns/stopaids.
  • Book your MP to come to your event, or go to their surgery so you can tell them what they can do to change things.
  • Collaborate as much as possible with as many different groups and societies at your university.
  • MOST IMPORTANTLY, don’t stop there! Use WAD as a platform for activities and campaigning throughout the rest of the year.

Medsin has already had a big influence on the Stop AIDS Campaign this year, for example by ensuring that demands for health systems (as well as for financing and drug pricing) are prominent at all levels of the campaign. Over the next year, the government are putting together their new 3-year plan for AIDS. There’s so much more to do. Let’s make sure we influence them too!

For more information, contact me at Stopaids@medsin.org. You can sign up to the monthly newsletter by emailing katy.athersuch@spw.org, and check out our website at http://www.stopaidssocieties.org.uk/.

Take care, and have a happy November!

Rafi

(National Coordinator)

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Sexpression

Sexpression National Conference was held in Sheffield 2 weeks ago. Sex in the Steel City was a brilliant and fascinating weekend. The weekend kicked off, after a Friday night in the pub, with Danish pastries and games and just got better from there on in! Steve Slack (Centre for HIV and Sexual Health in Sheffield) opened the weekend with a thought provoking talk on barriers to sexual health. He highlighted our culture of negativity towards sex and lack of open and honest communication. It left us puzzling over the lack of positive messages about sex especially given its good for you and fun (if safe and consensual of course)!! Dr Petra Boynton continued by talking about the messages that pornography gives out and how this influences and informs our sex lives. We also had an open discussion on the massive impact that the media has on society’s perceptions of sex. There were many brilliant workshops throughout the weekend on a variety of topics from HPV vaccine, teen pregnancy and sexual disorders and stigma to stop AIDS campaigning and training on new Sexpression projects. We had a fab Moulin rouge social on Saturday night which left us all feeling slightly worse for wear during Sunday morning’s talks on sexual abuse and child protection. The weekend finished with the election of the new National Committee 2008 – congratulations to them! Sexpression also launched their campaign over the weekend. We would like to see changes in the SRE (sex and relationships education) delivered within schools. We ask for a number of key changes;

  1. SRE is made compulsory
  2. The emotions surrounding sex and relationships are more fully discussed
  3. The importance of a stable family unit (not just marriage) is included
  4. Young people have a firm understanding of contraceptives and STIs and where and how to access these services. If you’d be interested in know more or getting involved let us know.

Sexpression also has another big event coming up soon too. It is on the 24th of November in Birmingham and it is Sexpression's Sexball! The evening of Sexpression fun is preceded by an afternoon of really interesting talks on sexual and maternal health globally including FGM, HIV and unsafe abortion. Then of course off we go in our black tie with a splash of red to the Sexball. Tickets are £35 including champagne reception, 3 course dinner and entertainment as well as the afternoons events and accommodation. To book at ticket email sexball@sexpression.co.uk Hope to see you there.

Last updated on Tuesday 20 November 2007 at 18:56.