The NHS as a site of structural violence

By Kavian Kulasabanathan

In conversation with Annabel Sowemimo, author of Divided – Racism, Medicine and Why We Need to Decolonise Healthcare

While the importance of health inequities along lines of race has finally started to be recognised over the last few years, most published research and policy-related literature within the UK stops short of naming racism – structural or otherwise – as a determinant of poor health.

In the context of a government that denies the existence of institutional racism, the political and legislative landscape in the UK has become markedly more hostile towards racialised people and their health.

The NHS Race & Health Observatory was launched in 2020 as an independent body to “identify and tackle the specific health challenges facing people from BAME backgrounds.” Yet it has failed to move beyond the problem diagnosis phase, compiling evidence and putting forward recommendations, with no ostensible translation into policy or practice.

And yet amongst all of this, as Annabel sets out, accessible scholarship around the colonial fingerprints on present-day racialised health inequities has been almost completely absent from the UK discussion. In this vein, one of my first questions was about who the book was for.

The NHS as a site of structural violence

By Kavian Kulasabanathan