Dear IFMSAians,
Colonization of Global Health is a matter of emerging importance as it affects our daily lives and our future as medical students without us noticing.
Global health as we know it today – in our research, our practice, and our programming – is the newest configuration of what was once ‘tropical health’ and ‘colonial medicine’. Yet in most major institutions and organizations today, global health is practiced in a depoliticized and a historical manner.
“Choices must be given back to patients and their families on how to manage the disease.” That includes integrating diagnosis in traditional health facilities, rather than creating a parallel system, and providing families who ultimately decide to care for patients with the resources to do so as safely as possible.
In light of this, IFMSA-Jo will be participating in an online conference on the Decolonization of Global Health held by the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.
The mission of the conference is to create a space for students, academics, and practitioners to join the rising tide of communities around the globe working to challenge structural violence that stems from historical colonialism and contemporary neo-colonialist practices in global health; and to work toward global health futures that are anti-colonial, anti-racist, and non-exploitative.
Join us next Tuesday to learn more on this topic, and listen to what students like yourselves have to say on the matter.
Interested participants can sign up here
