Yo Sí Sanidad Universal
= the movement in Spain for universal health care.
URL = http://yosisanidaduniversal.net/portada.php
Description
provisionaluniversity:
"The background was the successful and popular struggle against the privatization of the health care system in 2013. The so-called ‘Marea Blanca’ protests, or ‘white tide’, was made up of medical professionals and patients, forming a new kind of common front to defend a public good. A year before this, in April, 2012, the government had already decided to restrict universal health care access. Free health care was no longer available to undocumented migrants and people who had been without work for a certain period. While support, especially in Madrid, had been strong to resist the privatization of the public health system, support for the idea of universal health care was not so strong. In response, Yo Sí Sanidad Universal formed neighborhood groups for those people who are uninsured and thus unable to access the public hospitals. One of the principal tactics they employ is accompanying individuals to primary health care centers in groups in order to negotiate with the clinics to ensure that all patients receive treatment. Because this process takes place at a neighborhood level, the groups are able to get to know the healthcare professionals in the clinics, working with them to directly disrupt the exclusionary boundaries that have been created by the state. As well as ensuring that individuals are able to get the healthcare they need, ongoing negotiations with the clinics have also changed the relations between doctors and patients, producing a new form of health commons from below akin to what is happening in the solidarity clinics in Greece." (http://provisionaluniversity.wordpress.com/2014/03/18/the-abduction-of-europe-iv-social-movements/)