By Melody Chan and Ella Duggan
Young people from BAME communities or lacking English language skills are being offered advice on their health care and rights during a two week event in East London.
The event is taking place online and offline at the Paradox Centre in Chingford and Whitmore Community Centre in Hoxton, Hackney and aims to encourage young people and students to discover more about their healthcare rights. It is being run by the charity, East London Advanced Technology Training.
Guest speakers at the Health Festival including East London-based doctors will cover topics such as mental wellness tips, neighbourhood healthcare access, breast cancer awareness and COVID-19 protection at the festival.
Located on Kingsland Road in Hackney, ELATT offers free education to students of all ages seeking workplace skills. Funded by local authorities in Hackney, Tower Hamlets and Hounslow, it describes itself as a ‘learning community’, supplying those with a lack of English language skills with the education to get necessary healthcare.
Antony Harmer, chief executive officer of ELATT, told Eastlondonlines: “This year’s Health Festival is an excellent opportunity to connect [ELATT] students to practical knowledge and advice from a range of expert health partners.”
The event originated as a Covid-19 and flu vaccination scheme, funded by Tower Hamlets Council. It then evolved into an overall health festival organised by Yvonne Ackuaku, a communications coordinator with ELATT.
Ackuaku told ELL that said the intent of the festival was to provide essential healthcare knowledge to people of all ages and backgrounds: “We try to ensure all our learners across the board have access to healthcare”.
According to Ackuaku, the training centre’s students are predominantly multicultural with a large focus on teaching the English language.
Isabel Kidel, another event organiser told ELL: “We are really excited about our health festival: helping to reduce health inequalities in our community by increasing the knowledge and language skills of our students to talk about health.”
“All these [guest speakers] are volunteering…We all have the same aim. We understand the students are not only learning about English, [they are also] learning life skills.”
She added: “We think it’s particularly important to highlight mental as well as physical health: we are including sessions on mindfulness and nutrition so ELATT students can make small changes to their everyday lives that can make a big difference.”
Dr Gabrielle Macaulay, an NHS GP and a Black Women Womb Health Medical Educator, was the first guest speaker of the Health Festival. She told ELL: “My first impression was that it [ELATT] was a lovely place, it was inclusive and welcoming. I was invited to speak to the community about improving their social health.”
In response to the healthcare system in the UK, she said: “There are a lot of programmes going on to help health disparities, however, there is still a problem in supply and demand in primary care. The UK, compared to other countries, has less doctors and nurses. We still need to look for ways to improve and retain roles [in healthcare].”
