Too many unpaid carers in the UK are struggling by on their own, unseen by policy makers. Taking inspiration from the union movement, says Hannah Webster of Care Full, it’s time to build the collective solidarity that can amplify our demands for an economy that values and supports us – and lifts carers out of poverty.
‘I have two jobs: one that keeps someone alive – and one that I get paid for.’
Unpaid carers like me save the NHS £119 billion a year, says Laura Barnes of the We Care Campaign – yet our rewards include burnout, poverty, never seeing friends and being pushed out of jobs. In the second blog in our series for Carers Week in the UK, she says it’s time to value what the millions of carers do: and that starts with tailored services, financial support, flexible work and access to respite.
Two drops of life: for me – and millions like me – aid has been a gamechanger
Anthony Kamande still remembers the aid-funded polio vaccine he received at his Kenyan school at the age of eight. As such transformational aid is abruptly pulled across Africa, local governments cannot plug the gap, he says – much as we would like them to. Without a turnaround in aid policies, much of the continent faces a bleak future of surging health inequalities and rising poverty.
The UK’s Chancellor is driving disabled people deeper into poverty: she must think again
Planned cuts to disability benefits will be devastating for people already struggling to pay their bills, with stroke survivors, amputees and people with serious mental health conditions among the groups targeted, says Samuel Thomas of anti-poverty charity Z2K.
Want an economy that works for women? Keep care services public – and fund them properly
Deep cuts to public spending or abandoning provision to profit-making providers will not deliver the decent services millions of women so urgently need, say Myrah Nerine and Rachel Noble.
Who can’t afford to get ill? The missing target in the World Bank’s drive for Universal Health Coverage
With the bank poised to replenish funds to back expansion of healthcare among the world’s poorest people, it needs to measure what matters – and what matters is that billions are being forced into poverty and hardship by the costs of care. Anna Marriott, Rosemary Mburu, Harjyot Khosa and Waiswa Nkwanga on a critical omission from the Bank’s ‘IDA21’ policy package.
Why we must never repeat the mistakes of a ‘gender-blind’ COVID response
Pandemics are bad for women’s health – but they are also bad for their labour rights, suggests research from Matahari Global Solutions and the People’s Vaccine Alliance. Harry Bignell and Abha Jeurkar set out key gendered impacts of the pandemic – including the impact on trans and non-binary people – and call for pressure on global leaders to make sure we avoid them in future.
Bernie Sanders on billionaires, inequality and the fight against ‘global oligarchy’
We’re delighted that Senator Bernie Sanders has written a foreword to this year’s Davos report. Here are his powerful thoughts on our bleak economic reality – but also reasons to be hopeful as more and more people join the fight for economic justice.
I’m an unpaid carer: I have no paid job – but I do have value
The value of unpaid care for disabled, ill and older people in the UK is equal to the entire budget of the NHS, yet it’s not even counted in our GDP. In a blog for Carers Week, Katy Styles explains why she founded the grassroots, volunteer-led We Care campaign to demand a new deal for the millions of invisible carers like her.
The pandemic treaty must put people before Big Pharma profits
How can governments negotiating a new deal on pandemic preparedness and response make sure they don’t repeat the failures of COVID-19? They must ignore corporate lobbying and address the patent regimes that blocked billions from accessing lifesaving vaccines, says Abha Jeurkar
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