Rebel with a cause: how Health Equals took the message to the public in 2024

Back in November 2021, the Institute of Public Policy Research published a report Making Change: What works? As the country came out of the pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis loomed, the report was a timely offering. It looked at four areas of social injustice to understand what worked in delivering change for some and why others have seemingly failed. One area was health inequalities – an issue that rises and falls in terms of political interest but has thus far been stubbornly resistant to change.  

Looking back over the past year and the work of Health Equals’ campaign, I was reminded of this report.  

Taking the message to the public

Health Equals launched in 2023 with its Lives Cut Short campaign. It set out to highlight the stark inequalities in life expectancy across the UK. Nothing new in this, you might think. Except that rather than repeating these facts to politicians, Health Equals took the message to the public.  

In doing so, we filled a gap that the IPPR report had identified in the health inequalities ecosystem. It argued that for change to take hold there needs to be a mix of organisations and individuals engaged that can take on roles of rebels, reformers, organisers and helpers. While many fitted the bill of three of these roles, there was a distinct absence of ‘rebels’ – people who draw public attention to the nature and scale of the problem. 

The extent of health inequalities in the UK – so well known to public health professionals – is largely hidden to the general public. And without public understanding and concern, it becomes easy for politicians to ignore in the face of more pressing priorities.  

While Health Equals is far from the forms of activism familiar from other campaigns, such as Extinction Rebellion and Black Lives Matter, it shares a common purpose: to mobilise the public to express their concern.

Everyone has a role to play

Health Equals brings together 27 member organisations and a fast-growing group of supporters spanning charities, thinktanks and large employers.  

By building a diverse coalition it underlines the point that every aspect of our society shapes our health, and everyone has a role to play in making it better. The homes we live in, the money in our pockets, the food on our plate or the air we breathe, all have the potential to improve – or diminish – our health. And our health doesn’t just matter to ourselves and our families, declining health in the UK is now a cause for national concern.  

The IPPR report also talks about the importance of seizing external events. The decline in working-age health, coupled with budget constraints, has created a receptive context to the issue of health inequalities. Politicians can see that, as much as the NHS needs investment, this isn’t going to solve the health crisis. This makes for an ideal opportunity to build support for measures that help people stay healthier for longer.  

Make Health Equal

Over the past 6 months, Health Equals has delivered a new, highly successful campaign: Make Health Equal. Harnessing the enduring appeal of babies, they created Britain’s ‘youngest protest’ – a ‘demonstration’ in central London made up of 50 giant photos of babies taken from all parts of the UK. And on each poster was the baby’s life expectancy. Ranging from 74 in Birkenhead and Middlesborough to 90 in Kensington.  

This initial stunt was followed with a series of online regional campaigns, such as this one for the North East of England. Working with local voluntary organisations, the Make Health Equal campaign didn’t simply highlight the injustices in life expectancy, it also pointed to the solutions. It showcased the services and support that were helping people across Britain to build the foundations for a healthy live.  

Through sharing stark facts using a life expectancy look-up tool, which more than 100,000 people used, and pulling on heart strings with the Louis and Lorcan video, the campaign drove more than 300,000 people to the Health Equals website with more than 800 emailing their MP or candidate to express concern. And last month more than 60 MPs signed up to the Health Equals Parliamentary Champions Network.  

The level of public engagement the Make Health Equal campaign has generated from a standing start has been impressive. It shows that when presented with the evidence, people care about the extent of health inequality in our society. It also shows that when the public care, so do politicians.  

What next?

Next year will be a critical year for the campaign with considerable scope to create more opportunities to be healthy. Whether it's influencing the employment rights bill, the children’s wellbeing bill, or the renters’ rights bill, Health Equals is building new and bolder plans to engage the public in the need for government to act on these issues.  

Health inequalities are a hidden injustice. The way our social context shapes our outcomes means that we tend to normalise the life expectancy we see around us. If your grandparents died at 70 and your parents at 75, it may not even occur to you that for other people, with different opportunities, their norm is living well into their 80s and 90s. As someone said to me recently, ‘If you want to improve your health, the best thing you can do is choose your parents.’

Make Health Equal is bringing visibility to these inequalities, explaining their causes and presenting solutions. It is the first initiative of its kind, taking a campaigning approach to the underlying causes of health inequalities.  

Choosing your parents isn’t an option open to any of us. But being born into a society that provides the building blocks of good health is.    

This content originally featured in our email newsletter, which explores perspectives and expert opinion on a different health or health care topic each month.