At HIP, we begin from the truth that all people are worthy of dignity, belonging, and the conditions to be healthy and thrive. Our vision is rooted in an understanding of our profound interdependence: our health, and the health of our planet and all living beings, are bound together across race, class, gender, ability, immigration status, geography, and all other categories that are used to divide us. 

We know that building a just society requires transforming the systems that harm us and imagining and organizing into being the world we desire. Grounded in this understanding, we lead with values of intersectional racial justice, community power-building, collective care, and the transformation of structures and power imbalances that shape health. 

In this moment of intensifying economic inequality, rising authoritarianism, escalating anti-Black racism, and the intentional dismantling of our democratic institutions, public health cannot be neutral. We cannot stand by and watch the clear consolidation of authoritarian and corporate power, the proliferation of tactics intended to dehumanize and divide, the heightened criminalization of our communities, and the undermining of public institutions that aim to serve the public good. These trends are not new, but they are accelerating. 

Our field of public health has a responsibility to respond with solidarity, clarity, and courageous action. Authoritarianism is a direct threat to public health; democracy,  community governance, and resourced and accountable public institutions are necessary conditions for our work and our collective well-being. 

To meet this moment, HIP is advancing a policy platform organized around five key issue areas that is aligned with a Health in All Policies (HiAP) approach. This approach acknowledges that health is determined not primarily in labs or hospitals, but in workplaces and homes, local and federal budgets, policing and immigration systems, climate, housing, and economic policy – and in the narrative and ideological landscapes that shape public understanding, democratic possibility, and what communities are able to win. 

This platform is an invitation to join us and our partners in our work: to block what harms us, to build what heals and nourishes us, to create the democratic conditions necessary for governance in service of the people, and to move together toward a world where everyone has the power, resources, and ability to thrive.