Skip to main content
23 results
  • Article
  • Article

Medics and the bomb

| Taras Young

Would a nuclear attack on the UK overwhelm the NHS? At the height of the Cold War, despite government optimism, medics predicted doom.

  • Article
  • Article

Fleeing fear, defying prejudice

| Sedra Al-Yousef

As teenage refugee Sedra Al-Yousef grappled with rebuilding her life and education in another country, at the same time she used compassion and humanity to demolish populist anti-refugee myths.

  • Article
  • Article

Thomas Sankara and the stomachs that made themselves heard

| Perry BlanksonAnna Keville Joyce

Thomas Sankara’s vision to transform farming and health in Burkina Faso turned to dust with his assassination. Perry Blankson highlights the considerable achievements of Sankara’s brief span in power.

  • Article
  • Article

A nose through Blythe House

| Laura HumphreysKevin Percival

Recently sold and emptied out, Blythe House was once one of the UK’s biggest museum storage facilities. Here, museum worker Laura Humphreys reflects on her relationship with the store’s architecture, objects and aromas.

  • Article
  • Article

Why even plastic surgery can’t hide you from facial recognition

| Sharrona PearlSteven Pocock

Once upon a time, plastic surgery allowed a few notorious criminals to evade the law. But today, sophisticated facial-recognition technology has turned dreams of anonymity to dust.

  • Article
  • Article

The housing that gives hope to refugees

| George KafkaMamadou

A safe place of one’s own can be a source of healing and hope. George Kafka reports on two Athens-based projects helping displaced people by putting housing first.

  • Article
  • Article

What is structural violence?

| Laura BuiJessa Fairbrother

Structural violence is seemingly invisible. But its tentacles have invaded every part of many people’s lives, thoughts, experiences and expectations, shaping them in ways they don’t even realise.

  • Book extract
  • Book extract

Inside the Cold War mind

| Martin SixsmithSteven Pocock

Martin Sixsmith explores the competing national psyches of Russia and America, and a world divided between their irreconcilable visions of human nature.

  • Article
  • Article

The island of unclaimed bodies

| Allison C MeierAaron Asis

In New York, those who live and die on the extreme edges of society are buried on an isolated island, often forgotten and unmourned. But recent legal changes aim to reduce stigma and restore their dignity.

  • Article
  • Article

Do good mothers make good democracy?

| Charlie WilliamsSarah MarksDaniel Pick

To be psychologically fit for democracy, one distinguished paediatrician argued that you need a ‘good enough mother’ – and that we must acknowledge the bad side of our feelings.

  • Article
  • Article

WhatsApp aunties and the spread of fake news

| Rianna WalcottMaïa Walcott

The advantages of WhatApp chat groups – especially as a cost-free way of keeping in touch with family around the world – make them fertile ground for the spread of bogus medical advice. Writer Rianna Walcott explores how to encourage ‘aunties’ in the community to question the truth of unattributed health hoaxes.

  • Article
  • Article

Children in burns prevention campaigns

| Shane Ewen

Whose responsibility is it to prevent accidental burns and scalds in the home? Shane Ewen’s research shows that it’s everyone’s concern.

  • Article
  • Article

On nature cures and taking the waters

| Jessica J LeeFaye Heller

When chilly outdoor swims began to chip away at her depression, Jessica J Lee was drawn to a closer study of the complex natural world around her.

  • Article
  • Article

Leaving Mexico and finding refuge in hope

| Laura Morales

In Mexico, violence of all kinds – organised, street, domestic – is accepted as normal. From the UK, Laura Morales speaks out and fights to help those suffering back home.

  • Article
  • Article

Eugenics and the welfare state

| Indy BhullarGergo Varga

Indy Bhullar explores the ideas of William Beveridge and Richard Titmuss, who were strongly influenced by eugenic thinking, and yet championed the idea of the welfare state.

  • Article
  • Article

The sweet sound of synthetic speech

| Alex LeeIan Treherne

After Alex experienced a serious deterioration in his sight, he came to rely on artificial voices to help him with everyday tasks. Find out how synthetic speech came to be developed.

  • Article
  • Article

Doctor in the house

| Ishani Kar-Purkayastha

A house is not always a home – sometimes it’s impermanent, impersonal. But other aspects of the itinerant life can be the source of a sense of home.

  • Article
  • Article

Tracing the toxic story of tear gas

| Imani Jacqueline BrownFungai Marima

Investigating tear gas – from factory to Black Lives Matter protest – Imani Jacqueline Brown uncovers a toxic legacy where pollution, violence and racism are intimately entwined.

  • Book extract
  • Book extract

Why the NHS is worth saving

| Gavin FrancisJames Glossop

In this extract from his latest book, ‘Free For All’, Dr Gavin Francis poses challenging questions to be addressed if a health service that’s free for all at the point of use is to remain possible.

  • Article
  • Article

A symbol of a lost homeland

| Yasmeen Abdel MajeedJacqueline Reem Salloum

The story of one protective amulet from Palestine reveals a complex tale. Encompassing the personal history of an influential doctor and collector, it provides a window onto dispossession and exile, and the painful repercussions that are still felt today.

  • Article
  • Article

A story of death, trauma and austerity

| Marienna Pope-Weidemann

Marienna Pope-Weidemann, whose teenage cousin Gaia died after going missing, advocates a rethink of our systems, which currently fail many in mental distress.

  • Article
  • Article

The unearthly children of science fiction’s Cold War

| Ken Hollings

In the 1950s a new figure emerged in British novels, film and television: a disturbing young alien that revealed postwar society’s fear of the unruly power of teenagers.

  • Long read
  • Long read

Rehab centres and the ‘cure’ for addiction

| Guy StaggJess Nash

Guy Stagg takes us on a brief history of rehab centres and their approaches to addiction and recovery.