HEALTH CARE NOT WEALTH CARE Posters on Health Activism & Social Justice Health Care Not Wealth Care
Table of Contents
Health Care Not Wealth Care Posters on Health Activism & Social Justice
was funded by the Mike Kelley Foundation for the Arts, California Arts Council, City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, with additional support from The Getty Foundation, Los Angeles County Arts Commission, and individual donors.
MIKE KELLEY FOUNDATION FOR THE ARTS
I.
Injustice in Health Care
II.
Health & Safety on the Job
III.
Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
IV.
Who Profits?
V.
Silence = Death
VI.
Reproductive Rights
VII.
Violence: A Public Health Crisis
VIII.
Disability Rights
IX.
Organizing for Health Justice
Healthcare Not Wealth Care Posters on Health Activism & Social Justice Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane. — Martin Luther King, Jr.
Why is U.S. health care so expensive? Why, in the world’s richest country, do more than 29 million people lack health-insurance coverage, while many millions more are underinsured? Why is maternal mortality—death related to pregnancy or childbirth—more frequent now in the U.S. than 25 years ago? Of the top 12 industrialized countries, why does the U.S. have the lowest average life expectancy and the highest infant mortality rate? Race and racism factor into health care, as members of racial and ethnic minorities are less likely than whites to obtain preventive health services, and often receive
lower-quality care. Many predominately minority and low-income communities are located in “health care deserts” with few local health services. They also have worse health outcomes for certain conditions, including lower survival rates for heart disease, breast cancer, and stroke. Black infants in the U.S. are now more than twice as likely to die as white infants—a racial disparity that is, in fact, wider than in 1850, 15 years before the end of slavery, when most black women were considered property. Medical debt is uniquely American—unimaginable in other developed countries. In the U.S., many people with good insurance find it only lasts as long as they hold their current job and maintain their health. The largest numbers of people entering into medical bankruptcy are fully
insured. A 2019 study found that 66.5 percent of all bankruptcies were tied to medical issues—either because of high costs for care, or time out of work. More than half a million families go bankrupt every year because of medical bills and related health issues. Meanwhile, health industries such as insurance, hospital, and pharmaceutical corporations rake in billions annually, even as they invest more money in lobbying than any other special interest. This helps explain why our health care crisis seems intractable. The absence of affordable and accessible health care creates life-threatening conditions, and posters are at the forefront of the struggle for solutions. Throughout the world, they are central to educating about health care issues and organizing
for health care justice. They call attention to vital topics, galvanize communities, and present alternatives to current health care systems. Health Care Not Wealth Care explores multiple concerns, including environmental justice, occupational health and safety, reproductive rights, disability rights, health care inequalities, HIV/AIDS, and the politics and economics of health care. This exhibition shows that health care is not a single issue, and exemplifies the Center for the Study of Political Graphics’ mission to link art and social action.
Carol. A Wells Founder and Executive Director Center for the Study of Political Graphics
01
“Of all the forms of Title injustice inequality, in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.”
1. Health Care Is For People Not For Profit Chicago Women’s Graphics Collective Silkscreen, 1975 Chicago, IL
01. Injustice in Health Care
Health Care Not Wealth Care
2. Health Is a Right Not a Privilege! Carlos Callejo Silkscreen, Circa 1978, Venice, CA
The average ratio of doctors in U.S. = 1 for every 400 persons. For Blacks = 1 to 5,000! For Chicanos = 1 to 16,000! But in Beverly Hills...It’s 1 for every 61 persons! Defeat the Bakke Decision! 01. Injustice in Health Care
Dr. David Smith, a Bakersfield, CA, native and grandson of Oklahoma farmers, coined the phrase “Health Care Is a Right, Not a Privilege” in 1967, the same year he founded the first non-sectarian free clinic in the U.S., in San Francisco’s Haight Ashbury. This poster deals with racial disparities in access to health care. Members of racial and ethnic minorities are less likely than whites to obtain preventive health services, and often receive lower-quality care. They also have worse health outcomes for certain conditions, including lower survival rates for
heart disease, breast cancer, and stroke. Black infants in the U.S. are now more than twice as likely to die as white infants—a racial disparity that is, in fact, wider than in 1850, 15 years before the end of slavery, when most black women were considered property. To combat these disparities, health care professionals must explicitly acknowledge that race and racism play a critical— but too often unrecognized— role in health care. The Bakke Decision was an important ruling on affirmative action from the Supreme Court in
1978. Allan Bakke, a white man, was denied admission to the medical school at the University of California, Davis. Bakke contended that he was a victim of racial discrimination as the medical school had admitted black candidates with weaker academic credentials The court ruled that Bakke had been illegally denied admission to the school, but also that medical schools were entitled to consider race as a factor in admissions. The court thus upheld the general principle of affirmative action, while invalidating UC Davis’s quota program for minorities. Health Care Not Wealth Care
3. No a la privatización de la sanidad Confederación General del Trabajo Offset, Circa 2011 Spain
Don’t Privitize Health Care 10 Reasons to say NO to privatization. They will turn the health centers into private companies. It will encourage cost savings at the expense of reducing the quality of care. Health inequalities will increase, which will affect the lowest income sectors. Decrease in number of workers with increased risks for patients.
01. Injustice in Health Care
Inability to globally plan health care needs and resources. Attempt to corrupt staff by giving them money in exchange for savings in pharmacy, testing, premature discharges... Unprofitable patients (chronic, elderly...) will be downgraded Transforming staff into contract workers, garbage contracts, variable salaries.
Sale and rental of services, up until now public, to private companies.
Longer work day.
Loss of control over public money and lack of citizen participation.
Don’t let them profit from your health. Don’t play with your health. Health Care Not Wealth Care
4. Medicine for Health— Not Wealth Workers Research Unit of the Workers Party Offset, Circa 1985 Northern Ireland, UK
5. Number of People Who Go Bankrupt Every Year Because of Medical Bills The Other 98% Digital Print, 2016 Oakland, CA
Oppose the Belfast Private Hospital This poster was used in a campaign to fight the first privatization of a hospital in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Unfortunately, the campaign didn’t succeed and there are now many private hospitals. 01. Injustice in Health Care
Seventy-five percent of those bankrupted are insured. Health Care Not Wealth Care
6. Missing In Action Guerrilla Girls Offset, 1991 New York, NY
• National health care. • An end to poverty and homelessness. • No more discrimination. • A cure for AIDS. • Child care and education for everyone. • Reproductive rights for all women. • A safe environment. • An alternative energy policy. A Public Service message from Guerrilla Girls Copyright © Guerrilla Girls, courtesy guerrillagirls.com
01. Injustice in Health Care
Health Care Not Wealth Care
02
Health & Safety on the Job Health Care Not Wealth Care
7. Your Job Is Killing You
Red Pepper Posters Offset, 1976 San Francisco, CA
02. Health & Safety on the Job
From 1961 to 1969, 126,000 people were killed on the job in the U.S., and 46,000 Americans were killed in Vietnam. Two and a half times as many were killed on the job as in Vietnam.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
8. Safety or Else
Ange; Miners Art Group Offset, Circa 1976 Belle, WV Coal Operators Grow Rich While Miners Die
Coal mining is one of the most dangerous jobs in the country, and the energy it produces is dirty and contributes to global warming. Nevertheless, coal mining continues to be an important part of the economies of many states—Montana, West Virginia, and Kentucky being the top three coal-producing states. Despite numerous fines and citations, profits are too often prioritized over worker safety, and miners continue to die when management ignores safety precautions. This poster was produced by
02. Health & Safety on the Job
miners who were also artists, calling themselves the Miners Art Group. A number of deadly mining disasters occurred in Kentucky and West Virginia in the 1970s, and the poster refers to these events and the union organizing that resulted. Notable are the miners: both black and white are represented working together. A dead miner and a grieving family are shown in the foreground. Hooded Klansmen are in the back because strikers in Kentucky and West Virginia were often threatened or attacked by members of the Ku Klux Klan, who also
served as strikebreakers or “scabs.” Seated in front of the Klansmen is Judge F. Byrd Hogg, who consistently ruled against striking miners during the infamous Brookside Strike (1973-74) in Kentucky, until it was discovered that he owned a coal mine. After 13 months, and a court decision in favor of the workers, the company agreed to the strikers’ demands. The strike was the focus of Barbara Kopple’s 1976 Oscar-winning documentary film, “Harlan County USA.” Health Care Not Wealth Care
9. More Than a Paycheck
Doug Minkler Silkscreen, 1987 Berkeley, CA
02. Health & Safety on the Job
VDT (Video Display Terminal) Operators bring home more than a paycheck. They bring home eye strain, back pain, headaches and stress. These problems are not personal but the result of hours of high speed, detailed, repetitious work.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
10. America’s Workers Are Dying to
Build Your Car Lenora Davis Chicago Area Committee on Occupational Safety & Health (CACOSH) Offset, Circa 1980s Chicago, IL
Car Parts and Industries Engine Block Foundry
Sheet Steel Body Stamping Plant
RIP
Related Diseases and Injuries Silicosis, Cancer, Burns Deafness, Amputations Dermatitis and Lung Disease
Gears
Machine Shop
Leukemia
Tires
Lung Cancer, Asbestosis
Rubber Plant
and Mesothelioma
Trim and Bumpers
Lead Poisoning
Windows
Nasal and Sinus Cancer
Chrome Plating Glass Factory
Vinyl Tops and Seats
Lung Disease, Cataracts
Plastics Plant
Angiosarcoma (Liver Cancer)
Copper Wire
Lead Poisoning, Liver Disease
Smelter
Paint
Emphysema and Bronchitis
Pigment & Solvent Plant
Stress, Mental Disturbances
Assembly
Leukemia and Skin Cancer
One of every four American jobs is related to the auto industry. Disease, injury, and death are a part of too many of these jobs—from the foundry workers who cast the engine blocks, to the textile workers who make the seat cushions. America’s workers aren’t really dying to build your car—they’re being killed. Work doesn’t have to be deadly. In every industry, workers are fighting to eliminate hazards on the job. Give them your support. CACOSH is a coalition of unions working to clean up the workplace.
Gasoline Refinery
02. Health & Safety on the Job
Health Care Not Wealth Care
11. Fatigue Kills! International Transport Workers’ Federation Offset, Circa 1998 London, UK Cut working hours
Truck drivers are under increasing economic pressure when they work as misclassified “independent contractors” without guaranteed hours, wages, or benefits. In addition, they are often required to lease trucks owned by the trucking company they work for. The economic squeeze translates to drivers working long hours and compromising health and safety standards in order to earn a living.
largest trucking companies were ordered to pay $6 million to 24 drivers for unlawful deductions, unreimbursed expenses, unpaid minimum wages, and unpaid meal and rest breaks. For thousands of other truck drivers, the conditions remain unchanged.
There have been strikes and legal battles by workers in the Ports of Los Angles and Long Beach to remedy drivers’ plight. In February 2019, two of the 02. Health & Safety on the Job
Health Care Not Wealth Care
13. Freedom from Reproductive Hazards Is Our Legal Right Doug Minkler National Lawyers Guild Reproductive Rights Task Force Silkscreen, 1982 Berkeley, CA
12. More Workers Without Health Benefits Mariona Barkus Illustrated History — No. 13 Offset, 2004 Los Angeles, CA WASHINGTON, D.C.— An additional 2.6 million adults joined the ranks of the uninsured as businesses cut costs by either not offering health insurance or passing on more of the costs to workers who can’t afford the increased expense. A higher number of uninsured means more people are living with serious illness and dying prematurely. 02. Health & Safety on the Job
Demand Information and Protection
The Bottom Line is on the backs of the workers.
Reproductive rights include not only freedom from chemical, nuclear and occupational hazards but also access to abortion, safe birth control and the end to sterilization abuse. Health Care Not Wealth Care
14. Healthy Workplaces Work! Ricardo Levins Morales WorkSHIFTS Digital Print, 2004 Minneapolis, MN [on sign: I can live without Black Lung] Stopping Harmful Impact from Tobacco Smoke in the Workplace Respect Workers’ Rights ClEan Air Solidarity Union Power SafEty ColleCtive Action HealThy Workers 02. Health & Safety on the Job
This poster shows different workplace environments, including (clockwise from upper left): food service workers, an assembly line, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, striking coal miners, office workers, and a slaughterhouse. The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire on March 25, 1911, in New York City, was the deadliest industrial disaster in the history of the city, and one of the deadliest in U.S. history. 146 garment workers (123 women and 23 men) died from the fire, smoke inhalation, or falling or jumping to their deaths. Most of the victims were recent Italian and Jewish immigrant women aged 14 to 23.
Because the doors to the stairwells and exits were locked (a then-common practice to prevent workers from taking unauthorized breaks and to reduce theft), many workers who could not escape from the burning building jumped from the upper windows. The fire led to legislation requiring improved factory safety standards and helped spur the growth of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union (ILGWU), which fought for better working conditions for sweatshop workers.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
03
Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet Health Care Not Wealth Care
15. Freedom to Breathe U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare; Public Health Service; Consumer Protection and Environmental Health Service; National Air Pollution Control Administration; U.S. Government Printing Service Offset, 1969 Washington, DC Control Air Pollution
03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
16. Logique de Profit / Logique de Mort Fédération Anarchiste Offset, 2007 Paris, France This French anarchist poster condemns the practices and policies of multinational corporations, which often prioritize profits over the health of people and the environment. Its targets include pollution, oil spills, nuclear waste disposal, and the giant agribusiness firms claiming that genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are safe and beneficial. It also blames the G8, the eight largest industrialized countries, for allowing corporations to continue polluting the world. [see Poster #18 for more on GMOs]
Logic of Profit / Logic of Death GMO, Agro-Business, G8 , Pollution, Waste, Oil Spills Health Care Not Wealth Care
17. Nuclear Waste Is A Heavy
Burden to Lay on Our Children and Their Children and Their Children’s Children… Peace Studies Institute; Mary Lynn Sheetz Silkscreen, 1977 Colorado Springs, CO
03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
Nuclear waste is a toxic and radioactive byproduct of nuclear medicine, nuclear weapons manufacturing, and nuclear power plants. Nuclear fuel remains dangerously radioactive for thousands of years after it is no longer commercially useful. Past attempts to safely dispose of this waste have been ineffective in the long term, and leaks have contaminated air, soil, and groundwater, endangering human health.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
18. No GMO
Monsanto Must Go Eddie Lampkin, Taller Arte del Nuevo Amanecer (TANA) Silkscreen, 2012 Davis, CA
Shutdown Monsanto 03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) are living organisms whose genetic material has been manipulated in a laboratory through genetic engineering. They can increase a crop’s tolerance to pests and herbicides, resulting in a larger yield, and thus a larger profit. Increased tolerance to herbicides, however, results in using more pesticides and herbicides, and spraying them directly onto the plants. These toxins end up in the food, in the environment, and in us. Genetic engineering can create unstable combinations of plant, animal, bacterial, and viral genes that do not occur in nature, and may raise unforeseen issues in the health of humans. They have been linked to toxic
and allergic reactions as well as organ damage. Despite evidence showing that GMOs harm people and the environment, it is in the economic interest of corporations to insist that GMOs are perfectly safe. These corporations are often so powerful that they influence policy around environmental issues. In the European Union, food containing GMOs must be identified on the labels. This is not the case in the U.S. and Canada, where millions of people are unaware that they are consuming GMO food. Lastly, the use of GMOs increasingly puts agriculture under the control of biotechnology corporations whose primary motivation is profit, not health. Health Care Not Wealth Care
No GMO Monsanto Must Go Monsanto was a U.S.-based, multinational, agricultural and biotechnology company. During the Viet Nam War, it produced the deadly herbicide Agent Orange, which continues to cause birth defects in people exposed to it—including both the Vietnamese and U.S. military personnel who served in Viet Nam. Monsanto went on to produce roughly 90 percent of all genetically engineered seeds sold globally, as well as Roundup, a highly carcinogenic herbicide, currently the focus of many lawsuits. Many Monsanto seeds were genetically modified to produce their own pesticide or to survive repeated spraying with Roundup. Although these seeds are now 03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
widely used, questions and concerns remain about their impact on human and environmental health. Farmers purchasing these high-priced, patented seeds must sign contracts stating that they will buy new seeds every year, causing severe economic hardship to some farmers, particularly in developing countries. This poster was designed specifically for direct action to close Monsanto’s facility in Davis, CA. It was a completely nonviolent act of civil disobedience, part of a national day of action against Monsanto. The action shut down the plant for two days in September 2012. The ear of corn is flanked by two symbols warning of dangerous
materials: the left means radioactive waste, and on right signifies biohazard/ toxic. The poster is also one of many demanding a Monsanto boycott. These boycotts had two aims. First, they were designed to highlight Monsanto’s restrictive sales policies and their impact on farmers, with the goal of changing or ending patenting of seed technology. A second goal of boycotts against Monsanto and other companies making products containing GMOs was—and continues to be—the implementation of a GMO-labeling policy so that consumers would know which products contain GMOs, and could make informed buying decisions.
The U.S. is the only industrialized country that does not label or prohibit GMO food, and since 1996, U.S. consumers have been eating GMO food without knowing it. Monsanto actively resisted labeling, and in 2014—along with DuPont, Dow, Bayer, and others— even sued the state of Vermont over its labeling legislation. The campaign to label GMO food continues to gain support in the U.S. In 2018, Bayer, a German pharmaceuticals and chemical giant, purchased Monsanto for $63 billion, and retired the infamous Monsanto brand name, long considered an “example of American corporate evil.”
Health Care Not Wealth Care
19. Eat Fast Die Young
Robbie Conal Offset, Circa 2005 Los Angeles, CA
This poster promoted “Fast Food Nation,” a 2005 film directed by Richard Linklater that was loosely based on Eric Schlosser’s 2001 book of the same name, which exposed the dark side of the U.S. hamburger industry.
Do You Want Lies With That?.com 03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
Health Care Not Wealth Care
20. Lead Paint Damages
Your Brain…Join the General Rent Strike Seth Tobocman Housing Solidarity Network Offset, 1996 New York, NY
03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
We demand removal of lead paint enforcement of housing codes repairs+services We demand a rent reduction General Rent Strike! Join the General Rent Strike If you have lead paint, holes in walls or ceilings, falling cielings [sic], leaking pipes, broken stoves+refrigerators, peeling paint, clogged toilets, defective lights+outlets, lack of water pressure, no heat or hot water, broken locks, no security, no maintenance or cleaning, mice, rats, roaches, broken stairs, loose steps, these and other conditions are violations of housing code and give you the right to withhold rent payments!
In the 1990s, the Housing Solidarity Network organized rent strikes in Harlem, a majority black neighborhood where thousands of tenants were facing threats of eviction. Many of these tenants lived in buildings owned by New York City’s Housing Preservation and Development. These units were often unsafe, violated city housing codes, and exposed tenants to hazardous lead paint, which can cause irreversible learning disabilities and behavioral issues in children. The rent strikes put pressure on the city government and saved the homes of thousands of people facing eviction. Health Care Not Wealth Care
21. Exide
Wendy Gutschow for the University of Southern California, Southern CA Environmental Health Sciences Center in collaboration with East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice Digital Print, 2016 Los Angeles, CA
7 million pounds of lead that residents have been exposed to over 30 years #NoMoPlomo 03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
In 2000, Exide Technologies purchased a battery recycling plant that had operated since 1922 in Vernon, CA. The plant operated around the clock seven days a week, crushing, melting, and processing car and truck batteries to extract the metal lead to create new batteries. In 2013, residents of the lowincome Latino communities around the facility learned that the plant had been spewing lead and arsenic emissions into their neighborhoods for decades. It was also learned that the state agency responsible for overseeing the plant had never demanded that Exide meet all the requirements for a full permit.
Outraged community members and environmental justice groups in East and Southeast Los Angeles demanded that the plant be shut down and that the soil around their homes be tested. In March 2015, Exide signed an agreement with the U.S. attorney’s office to close the plant permanently in exchange for avoiding prosecution for years of environmental crimes. After testing the soil, state officials found lead contamination as far as 1.7 miles away from the plant, meaning that up to 10,000 homes were affected. Lead has been found to cause learning disabilities and other behavioral problems in children, even at low
levels. The arsenic that the plant had emitted into the air also posed an increased cancer risk to as many as 100,000 residents Community advocates continue to fight for faster action to clean up the contamination, which may take several years and tens to hundreds of millions of dollars. USC’s Community Outreach and Engagement Program developed this poster, and East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice created the hashtag #NoMoPlomo to continue raising awareness.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
22. Citizens of Flint:
EAT LEAD Rudolph Arthur Pokorny Digital Print, 2016 Detroit, MI
In April 2014, in order to save money, the local government in Flint, Michigan, switched the city’s water source to the Flint River without undertaking standard corrosion controls. As a result, lead began leaching from the pipes. Flint’s majority low-income and black residents repeatedly reported a strange taste, smell, and appearance in their water, but their complaints were ignored for almost two years. In January 2016, the city was declared to be in a state of emergency after tests revealed high levels of lead in Flint’s tap water. Emails later revealed that the state administration had known
03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
about Flint’s contaminated water and had been supplying state employees with clean water for a year before the state of emergency was declared. Yet Flint’s disenfranchised population had no choice but to continue drinking and bathing in the contaminated water, despite their legitimate fears about its safety. A September 2015 study found that the number of infants and children with above-average levels of lead in their blood had doubled since the city first switched its water source to the Flint River. Many thousands of children in Flint have been exposed to drinking water with high levels of lead and may experience a range of serious
health problems. Close to 80 lawsuits were filed. One of these was filed by the Concerned Pastors for Social Action, the ACLU of Michigan, and others. It was settled in 2017, when the state was required to finance, and the city to complete, at no cost to Flint residents, the replacement of thousands of lead service lines. But the work is ongoing, and as of April 2019, 2,500 lead service pipes were still in place. In addition, a $220 million damage claim was filed against the Environmental Protection Agency for neglecting to warn Flint residents about widespread lead contamination. Health Care Not Wealth Care
23. Water Is not a
Commodity, It’s a Human Right Dan Chen Digital Print, 2011 Providence, RI
The faucet is comprised of the names of public utilities across the country, reinforcing the value of public ownership over privatized water. 03. Healthy People Need a Healthy Planet
24. Earth’s Waters
Ricardo Levins Morales Northland Poster Collective Digital Print, 2006 Minneapolis, MN
Your Birthright Earth’s Waters Now Property of the Global Bottled Water Industry You Can’t Live Without It! Sale! To Be Sold Back to You for $37 Billion Per Year
Clean water is necessary for life, and should be available for free, yet there are thousands of companies selling water worldwide. Nestlé is the largest in terms of sales, followed by CocaCola, Danone, and PepsiCo. Nestlé is the biggest food company in the world—among the many brands it owns are Dreyers, Gerbers, Purina, DiGiorno, Nespresso, and Stouffer. In addition, it owns almost 50 brands of water, including Perrier, S. Pellegrino, and Poland Spring. In 2016, during the height of California’s multi-year drought, Nestlé pumped out about 32 million gallons of water from the San Bernardino National Forest. As of this printing, they are still pumping. Health Care Not Wealth Care
04
Who Profits? Health Care Not Wealth Care
25. Drugs for Health, Not for Wealth Artist Unknown Silkscreen, Circa early 1970s United States
26. Boycott Nestlé for Unethical Promotion and Sale of Infant Formula in the Third World Rachael Romero, San Francisco Poster Brigade Third World Institute, Infant Formula Action Coalition (INFACT) Offset, 1978 San Francisco, CA
Genocide for Profit Boycott Taster’s Choice, Quik, Nescafé, Nestea, Decaf, Crunch, Souptime, and Lactogen; all Libby’s and Stouffer’s products; Cross and Blackwell’s, Keiller, Maggi, McVities, Crawford, James Keller & Son; also Deer Park Mountain SpringWater, Jarsburg and Swiss Knight Cheese. 04. Who Profits?
Health Care Not Wealth Care
Boycott Nestlé for Unethical Promotion and Sale of Infant Formula in the Third World From 1977 to 1984, an international boycott was conducted against Nestlé products to protest the company’s promotion and sale of infant baby formula in developing nations. The Nestlé boycott was the largest non-union consumer boycott in history. When the campaign began, Nestlé sales accounted for 50 percent of the infant formula market. The boycott was launched because Nestlé and other infant formula producers were telling new mothers, especially in poor communities in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, that formula was better for their babies than breast milk, while giving these mothers free samples of formula sufficient to last only until the women 04. Who Profits?
stopped lactating. This forced women to switch to the formula, which few could afford. The mothers’ poverty meant that they couldn’t buy enough formula for their children’s needs; the lack of clean water to prepare the formula meant that the formula was often unsafe; and high illiteracy rates meant that many mothers couldn’t understand the instructions in order to give appropriate and sanitary amounts. Thus this switch often resulted in the rapid spread of diarrhea, malnutrition, diseases, and death among formula-fed children. The boycott ended in 1984 when Nestlé
and other producers agreed to abide by infant formula advertising and sales guidelines set by the World Health Assembly, a committee of the World Health Organization. These guidelines were developed in 1981 as a direct result of the boycott campaign. The boycott was reinstated in 1988 when Nestlé and others broke their promise to abide by these standards. It continues today, as each year ten million infants in low and middle-income countries suffer from severe diarrhea, malnutrition, and disease as a direct result of bottlefeeding. Nearly one million of them die. Those who survive often suffer permanent physical and mental damage. Health Care Not Wealth Care
27. They Used to Make Us Pick It. Now They Want Us to Smoke It. Herschberger Coalition for a Smoke-Free City; Harlem Hospital Offset, 1991 New York, NY
04. Who Profits?
As smoking began to decline among the more educated and affluent in the late 20th century, tobacco companies sought new consumers by cultivating youth and minorities. This 1991 poster shows an exploitative history of profit-making on the backs of African Americans—first as enslaved people, now as potential smokers. Commissioned by Harlem Hospital and The National Black Leadership Initiative on Cancer, it was designed as a New York subway poster. The cowboy image refers to the Marlboro Man, a popular and iconic cigarette persona in ads and billboards from 1954-1999, when it was “forced to retire” due to growing awareness of the health risks caused by smoking. The Marlboro Man ads were original-
ly conceived as a way to popularize filtered cigarettes, which in the 1950s were considered feminine. While cigarette smoking continues to decline, vaping or e-cigarettes— which are also addictive and unhealthy—are gaining in popularity. As with cigarettes, youth and minorities are primary targets of advertising. They are also the primary users. In the nearly 30 years since this poster was made, the corporate drive for profit continues to be a priority over human health.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
28. Big Pharma Want$ You!
Rachael Romero Digital Print, 2018 Woodstock, NY
Health Care Consumers Big Pharma Want$ You! But Do You Want Them? Side Effects may include: fatigue, mood swings, liver and kidney damage, abdominal bleeding, bloating, dizziness, nausea 04. Who Profits?
The cost of drugs is the No.1 factor fueling higher health care costs. Drug costs also make up 19 percent of employer health plan costs. This is going on even as the pharmaceutical and health care industries spend more in lobbying to influence health policy and politics than any other industry. As an example of the extraordinary profits extracted by Big Pharma, U.S. insulin costs per patient nearly doubled in the brief period from 2012 to 2016, when the average price of insulin increased from 13 to 25 cents per unit. For the average patient using 60 units of insulin per day, the cost increased from $2,847 to $5,475 per year.
Pharmaceutical companies claim that high drug prices are needed to pay for the cost of research and development, but insulin has been on the market since the 1920s, and the most recent innovation took place 20 years ago. In 1923, its inventors sold the patent for $1 so that insulin would be available to all who needed it. Insulin is not an optional drug for people with Type 1 diabetes. Many people who cannot afford the increase are rationing the drug, taking less than they need. Some have died as a result.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
29. Wash Your Blues Away! Karen Redfern, Adbusters Media Foundation Offset, 2002 or 2003 Vancouver, Canada
One of the most successful spoof ads created by Adbusters, this poster parodies an ad for Tide, a popular laundry detergent, while simultaneously revealing the absurdity of both pharmaceutical and marketing promises. The poster—featuring a 1950s housewife made happy by Prozac as she cleans while wearing high heels—is a feminist critique of the use of tranquilizing drugs that were predominantly prescribed to women who were dissatisfied with the culturally restrictive roles imposed on them. Prozac was the wonder drug of the 1990’s, finding its way into the medicine cabinets of nearly 40 million people worldwide
04. Who Profits?
within the first 15 years of its release. Advertisements for the drug offered patient testimonies about how Prozac helped them to better meet social expectations, transforming them from depressed, reserved, and cautious, to motivated, outgoing, and confident. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI), like Prozac, were and are largely successful in helping patients with depression, OCD, and other illnesses; however, the science of psychiatric pharmaceutics was still fairly young at the time (the field of neuroscience had only just been coined in the 60s), so general ignorance, lax regulations, inappropriate prescrip-
tions, and a refusal to acknowledge the side effects of stopping treatments too suddenly gave pharmaceutical companies the leeway to take advantage of suffering patients.
manufacturers to disclose this potential side effect in bolded text at the top of packaging inserts. Big Pharma was now going to be held accountable for their products.
This began to change in 2004, when a concerning side effect of antidepressants came to light following an intensive FDA-conducted survey; in cases with children and young adults under the age of 25, some antidepressants were found to have a 4% chance in yielding depression itself as a side effect when starting or increasing prescriptions. The FDA issued a black box label– the strictest warning label the FDA can issue– on all antidepressants, which forced
Nowadays, information on mental health treatment is much more accessible, and the medication is safer. Avenues to discuss and manage side effects, and resources to stop treatment, are also readily available. If you or a loved one are suffering from depression or suicidal thoughts, please seek professional help or contact the tollfree Suicide Prevention Hotline at 1-800-273-8255. Health Care Not Wealth Care
30. In America, Prisons Have Become the Primary Mental Health Facilities. Derek Luciani Digital Print, 2006 Boston, MA From the mid-1950s to the late-1990s, many mental health institutions throughout the U.S. were closed, depriving former patients of adequate mental health care. As a result of this policy, called “deinstitutionalization,” many of these individuals have ended up in the criminal justice system. For example, in 2015, an estimated 56 percent of state prisoners, 45 percent of federal prisoners, and 64 percent of jail inmates had a mental health problem. 04. Who Profits?
31. Deductibilled Dave Loewenstein Digital Print, 2018 Lawrence, KS Deductibilled Or Just Not Covered? Either Way, You Pay! [Text in graphic] Mental Health • Dental • Preexisting Condition • Hospice • Family Planning • Emergency Room • Physical Therapy • Denied • All Ages
Health Care Not Wealth Care
05
Silence = Death Health Care Not Wealth Care
32. Silence = Death The Silence = Death Collective; ACT UP Offset, 1987 New York, NY
Why is Reagan silent about AIDS? What is really going on at the Center for Disease Control, the Federal Drug Administration, and the Vatican? Gays and lesbians are not expendable...Use your power... Vote...Boycott...Defend yourselves... Turn anger, fear, grief into action. AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power 05. Silence = Death
The Silence=Death Project, most known for this iconic poster, was the work of a sixperson collective founded in 1985 in New York City. Started as a consciousness-raising group at the height of the AIDS epidemic, the group became politically active when it created a poster to be wheatpasted throughout the city. Rejecting any photographic image as necessarily exclusionary, the group decided to use more abstract language in an attempt to reach multiple audiences. It
created the Silence=Death poster using the title phrase and a pink triangle, which during the 1970s had become a gay pride symbol reclaimed by the gay community from its association with the persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany, and during the Holocaust. In 1987, this Silence=Death poster was used by the newly formed group ACT UP as a central image in their activist campaign against the AIDS epidemic.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
33. Health Care Not Death Care Act Up LA/ Critical Mass Offset, 1990 San Francisco, CA
Health Care Not Death Care for Walker A Inmates Women With AIDS Behind Bars
In 1990, the overcrowded California Institution for Women at Frontera was the country’s second-largest women’s prison. All women diagnosed with HIV or AIDS were segregated inside, in the Walker A Unit. The conditions and treatment for these women were deplorable. There was no infectious disease doctor and no licensed infirmary. Women died in their cells without medical attention. Prison staff did not want to come in contact with those who were infected. Deaths were sometimes only discovered when food trays piled up. This poster was first used in a boisterous ACT UP/LA demon-
05. Silence = Death
stration outside the Frontera prison on November 30, 1990. Prisoners inside were placed on lockdown but could hear AIDS activists chanting, “Sisters on the inside, sisters on the outside, ACT UP is watching, you won’t die.” When a series of protests moved to the California Department of Corrections main offices in Sacramento, ACT UP took over the offices of the prison system’s chief medical officer to demand an end to inhumane conditions for incarcerated people with AIDS.
to Walker A. One woman, Judy Cagle, became the first inmate in the history of the CDC to be granted a compassionate release. The segregation policy was changed and the women with AIDS were moved into a medical facility. These actions by ACT UP/LA and other California ACT UP chapters, and in particular, the ACT UP/LA’s Women’s Caucus, inspired ACT UP chapters in other states to take action and advocate better treatment for all prisoners living with AIDS.
Several of ACT UP/LA’s demands were implemented. An infectious disease doctor was assigned Health Care Not Wealth Care
34. Pain of a Sexually Transmitted Disease! Mahila swathya avam Vikas ekak; FACET Offset, Date Unknown New Delhi, India
In India, especially in rural areas, women are often considered inferior. Many are sexually tortured and suffer harmful sexually transmitted diseases, but are too ashamed to tell anyone. They don’t consult doctors, keep their illnesses a shameful secret, and, as this poster describes, “cry their entire lives.” 05. Silence = Death
35. Fight for the Living Bradley Rader ACT UP/LA Offset, 1989 Los Angeles, CA
Removing Stigma Why be ashamed? Why are you silent? Do not cry, get cured
Remember Their Names Fight for the Living 1) Release AIDS drugs now! 2) Emergency federal program to end AIDS now! 3) End HIV related discrimination! 4) Quality health care for all! Shut down Federal Building. Demonstration and mass civil disobedience.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
06
Reproductive Rights Health Care Not Wealth Care
36. Abortion Is a Personal Decision Not a Legal Debate Chicago Women’s Graphics Collective Silkscreen, 1970 Chicago, IL
06. Reproductive Rights
Health Care Not Wealth Care
37. No a la Mortalidad Materna
Cline; Comision de Lucha contra la Mortalidad Materna Offset, Circa 1990 Nicaragua No More Maternal Deaths In the Bertha Calderon Hospital alone, 15 women arrive every day with serious vcomplications from illegal abortions. To choose maternity freely, we demand: Sex education Information about and access to contraceptives Pre- and post-natal medical attention Legal reforms Commission to Combat Maternal Mortality 06. Reproductive Rights
In 1979, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) overthrew the brutal U.S.backed Somoza dictatorship that had ruled Nicaragua since 1936. Many political and social advances followed, including in literacy, health care, agrarian reform, and women’s rights. In the 1980s, the Sandinista women’s association included abortion rights in its demands. Although the FSLN actively promoted women’s rights in many areas, legalizing abortion was not officially addressed—because of a desire not to upset the Catholic
Church. This was despite an epidemic of deaths of women having illegal abortions. This poster was produced soon after the Sandinistas were voted out of power in 1990 and Nicaraguan feminists were able to express their demands more openly. When FSLN leader Daniel Ortega was re-elected president in 2007, renewed attempts to placate the Catholic Church resulted in a complete ban on abortions—the most restrictive in all of Latin America. They are not even allowed in the case of incest, rape, or to save the life of the woman. Health Care Not Wealth Care
38. Congress, It’s Time
To Take A Stand Catholics For Choice Offset, 2015 Washington, DC
Just imagine a world without Planned Parenthood. It is a world where a dark, harsh landscape is all that remains for women who already have so little. Where a mother in Chicago works extra shifts to pay for groceries, but can’t afford contraception. Where a woman in the Appalachian hills takes several buses to a clinic, only to be told she cannot have her procedure and must come back. Where a woman in Tupelo with a family history of cervical cancer can’t go to a reliable health center for yearly Pap smears. Where a boy in Utica isn’t offered sex education at his school and cannot turn to a quality health care provider for information or
06. Reproductive Rights
services when he contracts an STI. Defunding Planned Parenthood would give the least among us even less.
make this possible for everyone, no matter what their means, where they live, or what they believe.
We, your fellow legislators and constituents, urge you to stand up It would rob us of compassionate for Planned Parenthood, to oppose caregivers and educators. It would any attempts to defund, and to punish the most vulnerable, taking listen to Catholics. Listen to the away their ability to make repromajority of Americans who recductive decisions according to ognize the critical importance of their own conscience. Planned Parenthood. It’s a sin to hold a conscience captive. Catholics believe that conscience isn’t a status symbol. We believe everyone has the ability to decide to be pregnant or not, and to protect oneself from sexually transmitted infections. Our laws should
We envision a world where a woman at risk of cervical cancer can get the care she needs from the people she trusts. Where rural women can get abortion care without extra days off work, expensive travel or waiting periods. Where the gap between poor women’s and privileged women’s
health closes for good. Congress can protect the people who will suffer most. Stand with Planned Parenthood before it’s too late—and the world without Planned Parenthood becomes a reality. As leaders who are Catholic, we are taking a stand. Congress, please stand with us. Fund Planned Parenthood. Join us at catholicsforchoice.org In good conscience Catholics For Choice Appeared in the Washington Post on September 28, 2015
Health Care Not Wealth Care
39. Think you can do whatever you want with your body? Think again. Pro-Choice Public Education Project Circa 2000s New York, NY
Reproductive rights are under attack. The ProChoice Public Education Project. It’s pro-choice or no choice. 06. Reproductive Rights
40. Fight for Choice Before It’s Too Late! Mili Smythe Offset, 1991 Los Angeles, CA
Roe v. Wade was the landmark decision issued in 1973 by the U.S. Supreme Court granting women the right to an abortion. This 1991 poster shows an hourglass, warning that time may be running out on legal abortions because of the growing number of anti-choice Supreme Court justices. Health Care Not Wealth Care
41. Of All Things from the
70’s to Make a Comeback, There’s One We Really Hate to See. Pro-Choice Public Education Project Offset, Circa 1999 New York, NY
Reproductive rights are under attack. The Pro-Choice Public Education Project. It’s pro-choice or no choice. 1 (888)253-CHOICE or www.protectchoice.org 06. Reproductive Rights
The poster depicts a Volkswagen Beetle, lava lamp, platform shoes, and a coat hanger. The first three items are regarded nostalgically, and are regaining popularity. In contrast, the coat hanger signifies self-induced abortions, and the poster’s message warns against returning to a time when abortion was illegal. Before Roe v Wade (1973) legalized abortion, some women took matters into their own hands and used coat hangers to scrape their uterus in order to end the pregnancy. This was extremely dangerous— the hanger often perforated the uterus—and too often women bled to death or became sterile.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
42. Stop Fake Clinics
Black Women for Wellness Digital Print, 2018 Los Angeles, CA
You have the right to make your own reproductive life decisions without shame, blame or guilt. Some places in our communities look like regular clinics but only exist to lie to women about their pregnancy options. Learn how to spot fake clinics in our community at www.stopfclinics.net 06. Reproductive Rights
Anti-choice extremists have been attacking abortion access in the U.S. since the procedure became legal in 1973. One of their tactics is fake clinics. There are close to 4,000 fake women’s health centers all over the country—more than twice as many as actual abortion providers. Sometimes called crisis pregnancy centers or CPCs, fake clinics do not provide comprehensive reproductive health care—or much of any health care. Instead, they use phony ads to trick pregnant women into making an appointment by promising “free ultrasounds” or “pregnancy support.” Once inside, the girls and women are lied to, shamed, and pressured about their reproductive health decisions. This often delays the procedure or pushes them past the deadline for a legal abor-
tion. Fake clinics are often made to look like medical facilities, yet they don’t practice medicine (outside of an occasional ultrasound or STI test). They are selective and misleading in the information they provide, and may even lie outright, such as by saying that abortion causes cancer. More and more, these predatory places are funded by taxpayer dollars, impacting poor women and people of color the hardest. For example, in the 2018 fiscal year, fake clinics received $40.5 million in taxpayer dollars from 14 states. Meanwhile, lawmakers in these same states slashed funding for public health initiatives and increased requirements for people with low incomes to access public assistance programs. Health Care Not Wealth Care
43. Genital Mutilation
Red Pepper Posters Offset, 1980 San Francisco, CA Genital mutilation has damaged the health and destroyed the sexuality of thirty million African women alive today. In the United States, clitoridectomies were done as recently as the 1940’s, and unnecessary sexual surgery continues today. Through genital mutilation, men control their property and the means of reproduction. In solidarity with African women and all women: that every woman may own her own body. 06. Reproductive Rights
When this poster was produced in 1980, the artists thought that the practice of female genital mutilation or cutting (FGM/C)—also known as clitoridectomies—had not been practiced in the U.S. since the 1940s. Unfortunately, this is not the case. The World Health Organization and the United Nations define FGM/C as “any partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or any other injury of the female genital organs for nonmedical reasons.” The practice is rooted in gender inequality, attempts to control women’s sexuality, and ideas about purity, modesty, and beauty. Adverse health effects can include recurrent infections, difficulty urinating and passing menstrual
flow, chronic pain, the development of cysts, an inability to get pregnant, complications during childbirth, and fatal bleeding. An estimated 100 to 140 million women alive today have undergone FGM/C. Three million girls may be at risk of FGM/C each year because they live in countries or communities where it is expected. The practice is most common in the western, eastern, and north-eastern regions of Africa, in some countries in Asia and the Middle East, and among certain immigrant communities in North America and Europe. In the U.S., more than 500,000 girls and women have experienced or are at risk of FGM/C. Health Care Not Wealth Care
44. Stop Forced Sterilization
People’s Press Silkscreen, 1970s San Francisco, CA
In Puerto Rico, 1/3 of the women of child-bearing age—sterilized. In the U.S., 20% of Black married women—sterilized. In India, men and women sterilized by law. Too many people is not the problem; people are our most precious resource. Yet billions of U.S. dollars are spent on population control while funds are cut for food, health care and child care. U.S. Imperialism is the problem. It steals the land; tears resources from the earth; robs and destroys the lives of the people for profit. Resist!!!
06. Reproductive Rights
This 1970s poster critiques the ideology of population control—the idea that zero population growth is the solution to problems like dwindling resources, world hunger, and pollution. It argues that the U.S. promoted population control as a way of directing attention away from the disproportionate use of resources by capitalist economies. By focusing on the outrageous and often coerced sterilization of countless women and men, the poster insists on reproductive rights as liberation from class, race, and sexual oppression. It identifies U.S. support for population control in Third World countries as an expression of this oppression. Health Care Not Wealth Care
45. Tree
Sheila Levrant de Bretteville Photo: Hella Hammid Women’s Graphic Center Peace Press Offset, 1981 Los Angeles, CA
Until 1974, when First Lady Betty Ford was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a mastectomy, many women were ashamed to admit that they had had a mastectomy. They felt it was a stigma to be hidden, and kept it a secret. In this 1981 poster, Los Angeles poet Deena Metzger celebrates her body and her health with a life-embracing tattoo of a tree branch covered with leaves. 06. Reproductive Rights
I am no longer afraid of mirrors where I see the sign of the amazon, the one who shoots arrows. There was a fine red line across my chest where the knife entered, but now a branch winds about the scar and travels from arm to heart. Green leaves cover the branch, grapes hang there and a bird appears. What grows in me now is vital and does not cause me harm. I think the bird is singing. I have relinquished some of the scars. I have designed my chest with the care given to an illuminated manuscript. I am no longer ashamed to make love. Love is a battle I can win. I have the body of a warrior who does not kill or wound. On the book of my body, I have permanently inscribed a tree. Text from TREE by Deena Metzger, published by Peace Press Health Care Not Wealth Care
46. La Leche Materna Es La Mejor Jane Norling Food & Nutrition Services, Santa Cruz Syracuse Cultural Workers Offset, 1980/1987 Syracuse, NY Mother’s Milk Is the Best
06. Reproductive Rights
Health Care Not Wealth Care
07
Violence: A Public Health Crisis Health Care Not Wealth Care
47. God Bless America
Handgun Control, Inc. Offset, Circa 1997 Washington, DC
In 1996 Handguns Murdered 2 People in New Zealand 13 in Australia 15 in Japan 30 in Great Britain 106 in Germany And 9,390 in the United States God Bless America. Stop Handguns Before They Stop You.
07. Violence: A Public Health Crisis
Health Care Not Wealth Care
48. Public Health Crisis
Mariona Barkus Illustrated History —No. 16 Digital Print, 2018 Culver City, CA
Update: As of 2018, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are no longer prohibited from conducting research on gun violence— as long as no government funding is used! 07. Violence: A Public Health Crisis
Made in America Public Health Crisis THE UNITED STATES — Calling U.S. gun violence a public health crisis, the AMA is actively lobbying Congress to overturn 20-year-old legislation blocking gun violence research by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The American Academy of Pediatricians has joined this effort since gun violence is now the third leading cause of death for children in the U.S. The 1996 ban on gun violence research stems from National Rifle Association lobbying to stop any research that could be interpreted as endorsing gun control.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
49. Rompamos el Silencio
Marisa Godínez Coordinador de Organizaciones Feministas Offset, Circa 1990 Peru
50. “Up to 50% of all Homeless Women and Children in this country are fleeing Domestic Violence”* San Francisco Print Collective Silkscreen, 2001 San Francisco, CA
Let’s Break the Silence No to Violence against Women Coordinator of Feminist Organizations 07. Violence: A Public Health Crisis
*National Coalition Against Domestic Violence Health Care Not Wealth Care
51. It Makes Me Feel Sad When My Mom Gets Hurt Southern California Coalition on Battered Women Offset, early 1980s Los Angeles, CA
I Just Want to Kill HIM! Domestic Violence is a crime against the future. Together we can stop the cycle of violence. 07. Violence: A Public Health Crisis
52. La Répression n’est pas un jeu Boycottons les jouets militaires J.P. Fanie Association québécoise des organismes de coopération internationale (AQOCI) Offset, Circa 1980s Montréal, Québec, Canada
Repression is not a game. Boycott war toys. Health Care Not Wealth Care
53. PTSD
Nicolas Lampert, Justseeds Repetitive Press Silkscreen, 2011 Montréal, Québec, Canada Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
07. Violence: A Public Health Crisis
“How is this a disorder? What part of being emotionally and spiritually affected by gross violence is disorder? How about Going to War and Coming Home with a Clear Conscience Disorder? I think that would be far more appropriate.” ...Matt Howard, Iraq Veterans Against the War Operation Recovery, ivaw.org, 2010 Nicolas Lampert, Justseeds-IVAW “War is Trauma” poster series, 2011, www.justseeds.org, www.ivaw.org
Health Care Not Wealth Care
08
Disability Rights Health Care Not Wealth Care
54. You Gave Us Your Dimes
Now We Want Our Rights Mark Morris Center On Human Policy Human Policy Press Offset, 1975 Syracuse, NY
08. Disability Rights
55. La ciudad debe ser diseñada
también para nosotros. Organización de Revolucionarios Deshabilitados Offset, Circa 1980 Nicaragua Immediately following the ouster of the Somoza dictatorship in 1979, [see poster#37], the Sandinista government began implementing many campaigns, including for literacy, agrarian reform and health care. Due to both the war and years of a polio epidemic, many Nicaraguans were disabled. The revolutionary government began producing posters such as this to raise awareness about the need for wheelchair accessibility.
The City Must also Be Designed for Us. Organization of Revolutionaries with Disabilities. Nicaragua, Central America Health Care Not Wealth Care
56. Nobody Is Perfect Klaus Staeck Steidl Göttingen Offset, 1981 Heidelberg, Germany
57. “R-Word” Is Hate Speech Photo: Richard Corman Special Olympics Southern California (SOSC) Digital Print, 2008 Long Beach, CA
This poster was carried in a Los Angeles, CA, demonstration on August 4, 2008, against the opening of the DreamWorks film “Tropic Thunder.” The film was picketed due to its frequent use of the term “retarded” to refer to people with mental disabilities. The demonstration was organized by the Special Olympics and the American Association of People with Disabilities, to protest using slurs against people with developmental disabilities. Most of the protesters had disabilities. Other signs read, “Call me by my name, not by my label,” “Tropic Thunder, Colossal Blunder,” and “Ban the Movie—Ban the Word.” 08. Disability Rights
Health Care Not Wealth Care
58. Piss on Pity
Karen Kerney and Mayer Shevin Photos: Tom Olin Center on Human Policy Syracuse Cultural Workers Offset, 1998 Syracuse, NY
Recognize Resistance to Change and Fight It Your attitude is my only handicap Nothing About Me Without Me You Gave Us Your Dimes Now We Want Our Rights I can’t even get to the back of the bus “Life Is a Daring Adventure or Nothing”—Helen Keller
08. Disability Rights
Health Care Not Wealth Care
09
Organizing for Health Justice Health Care Not Wealth Care
59. Social Justice Is the
Foundation of Community Health Painting: Frida Kahlo Community Health Works (Now: Metro Academies) Offset, Circa 2000s Berkeley, CA
09. Organizing for Health Justice
Community Health Works The Partnership of San Francisco State University (Department of Health Education) and City College of San Francisco (Health Education and Community Health Studies Department) www.communityhealthworks.org
Health Care Not Wealth Care
60. People’s Free
Health Center Black Panther Party Newspaper Offset, 1970 Oakland, CA
People’s Free Health Center “The Free Health Center occupies this land illegally according to the law, but we feel that the people’s authorization is the only authorization necessary.” 09. Organizing for Health Justice
In 1967, the first free clinic in the U.S. opened in San Francisco. Many others soon appeared, fueled by the counter-cultural, anti-war, feminist, and gay and lesbian movements of the times. The Black Panther Party (BPP) organized free and even mobile health centers across the U.S. v The photo features one of the earliest BPP Free Clinics. The BPP Boston chapter opened it in May 1970, and named it after Frank Lynch, an up-andcoming songwriter/musician who was killed by Boston police in 1968 while he was a patient in Massachusetts
General Hospital. The photo, which ran on the cover of the BPP newspaper, shows Panther Wayne Thomas helping Mrs. Mack, mother of Frank Lynch, down the stairs of the trailer serving as the clinic. The clinic was located on land to be used for a new superhighway that would have cut through the black community. An article on page 2 of this June 13, 1970, issue states: “A highway cutting through the Black Community will mean air pollution, increased accidents, housing shortages, and excessive noise. The Free Health Center occupies this
land illegally according to the law, but we feel that the people’s authorization is the only authorization necessary.” The Boston Black United Front sponsored Operation Stop to prevent the building of the highway, and the Boston BPP supported this effort by putting the clinic’s trailer on the property.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
61. Take Care Of Your Body
The Gay Community Services Center Peace Press Offset, Circa early 1970s Los Angeles, CA Herself Health Free Clinic All Services & Medicine Free All Women Staff Gynocological [sic Gynecological] Exams Birth Control Health-Sexuality Course General Health Care Pap Smears V.D. Screening Sponsored By: The Gay Community Services Center 09. Organizing for Health Justice
The Gay Community Services Center (now the Los Angeles LGBT Center) was founded in 1969 to provide services to the lesbian and gay community. Having women treated by women health practitioners, as promoted in this poster, came out of the feminist movement of the 1960s. Before women could reclaim control over their own bodies, they needed to understand their bodies. Under the male-dominated health care system, accurate information was often difficult to obtain, and research focused on white male diseases. In addition, natural childbirth was discouraged, C-sections were often scheduled for the convenience of the doctor, not the health of the woman or baby, and breastfeeding was discouraged.
The woman’s fist in the center of the poster holds a variety of medical instruments, including a speculum, which women across the country began using to examine their own bodies. In 1970, the Boston Women’s Health Collective published “Women and Their Bodies,” which was republished in 1971 as “Our Bodies, Ourselves.” It has sold millions of copies; its most recent edition was published in 2011. Women’s groups and clinics formed, offering safe and informed places to discuss many difficult— even taboo—subjects such as birth control, abortion, rape, and incest, as well as women’s sexuality and pleasure.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
62. A Saúde Ao Serviço
During the Mozambique War of Independence from Portugal (1964-74), the majority of health workers— most of whom were European—fled the country. When the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO), the Marxist organization that had initiated the struggle against Portuguese rule, took over the government, they inherited a small and dysfunctional health care system. In July 1975,
Do Povo República Popular De Moçambique Ministério Da Saúde Offset, 1981 Mozambique
Mozambique nationalized health care, focusing on expanding health care to rural regions of the country where a majority of the population lived. This 1981 poster was produced during the Civil War (1977-1992), during which the anti-Frelimo forces were supported by the pro-colonial and apartheid regimes of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and South Africa.
Health Care at the Service of the People National Campaign to Emulate Socialist Values 09. Organizing for Health Justice
Health Care Not Wealth Care
63. I Encuentro Continental
de la Medicina Indígena, Negra, Popular y Tradicional Centro Nacional de la Medicina Popular Tradicional Offset, 1992 Esteli, Nicaragua
First Continental Conference of Indigenous, Black, Popular and Traditional Medicine 500 years of indigenous, black and popular resistance 09. Organizing for Health Justice
64.
The Arms Race May Kill Her Photo: Mary Eng The Children’s Defense Fund Offset, 1980s Washington, DC
The Arms Race May Kill Her So May Poverty Help fight both Dear Lord Be Good To Me The Sea Is So Wide and My Boat Is So Small Health Care Not Wealth Care
65. Reduce Military Spending
Build the Health System Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) Offset, Circa 1998 (organization founded) South Africa
1 fighter jet = anti-retrovirals for 11800 patients for one year* *One Gripen fighter jet costs $118 million. To treat one HIV patient with anti-retrovirals for one year costs R10 000 R= Rand, currency of South Africa 09. Organizing for Health Justice
66. To Be Healthy We Must Be Free
G. D. Gall Photo: J. B. Powers Young Patriots Organization Offset, Circa 1970 The Young Patriots Organization was formed in Chicago in the mid-1960s to support young, white migrants from Appalachia. Although their members wore the Confederate battle flag on their berets and jackets, they protested racism, police abuse, and housing discrimination—often in collaboration with the Black Panther Party (BPP) and Young Lords Party, a Puerto Rican civil and human rights organization. In 1972, they began a free health clinic for their community, modeled after the BPP free clinics. [see poster #60] Health Care Not Wealth Care
67. Healthy Food For
the Barrio Favianna Rodriguez and Bryant Terry Offset, 2009 Oakland, CA
09. Organizing for Health Justice
ry farming industry is, because that reality is kept away from view. Even folks who try to “I put that [on] because the break in into factory farms food industry prevents us from to capture evidence of how really knowing how our food animals are being tortured, is made and at what cost. So they end up facing terrorism often products are not propcharges. Crazy, right? erly labeled, as indicated by the fight to label GMO prod“So the blindfold is about ucts, so we don’t have a sense saying that we are blind food consumers and that the corof what chemicals are in our porate food industry keeps us food. from knowing the truth about “Similarly most Americans how our food is produced. The have no idea about how dispeople who suffer the most are gusting and abusive the facto- communities of color.” Artist Favianna Rodriguez’s explanation of the blindfold:
Health Care Not Wealth Care
68. Save Medicaid Medicare
Social Security Xavier Viramontes San Francisco Poster Syndicate Silkscreen, 2018 San Francisco, CA
69. Time To Heal
John August Swanson Digital Print, 2017 Los Angeles, CA
“Health is not a consumer good, but a universal right. Access to health services cannot be a privilege.” —Pope Francis, July 5, 2016 Don’t Gut and Destroy These Programs Just to Give Tax Breaks to the Rich [photo caption] Jack and Cora Viramontes - San Pablo, CA xavierviramontes.com 09. Organizing for Health Justice
“Healthcare must be a fundamental human right, that we ‘are in this together’ and not just in words.” —RoseAnn DeMoro, Executive Director, National Nurses United, Feb. 2017 Health Care Not Wealth Care
70. Universal Healthcare:
Not A Radical Idea Medicare for All, Bernie Sanders for President Campaign Digital Print, Circa 2016 United States
09. Organizing for Health Justice
Medicare for All is a program to make health care a right, not a privilege. Supporters believe that everyone should have access to quality health care regardless of income or job. Everyone would be covered by one health insurance program administered by the federal government, with equal access to all medical services and treatments. All pharmaceuticals and services requiring a medical professional would be fully covered, including dental, vision, and mental health. All U.S. residents, including non-citizens, would be covered.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
71. Stop the Pain [of health-
care costs] Artist Unknown Offset, 2007 United States Support Single Payer Universal Health Reform
09. Organizing for Health Justice
A single-payer system is a health care system in which one entity—a single payer— collects all health care fees and pays for all health care costs. Proponents of a single-payer system argue that because there would be fewer entities involved in the health care system, the system could avoid an enormous amount of administrative waste. Instead,
all health care providers in a single-payer system would bill one entity for their services. Within a single-payer system, all citizens would receive high-quality, comprehensive medical care plus the freedom to choose providers to a greater extent than most network-based health plans allow today. Paperwork would also be dramatically reduced.
Health Care Not Wealth Care
72. Single-Payer Health
Care Is Feminist California Nurses Association Offset, 2018 Oakland, CA
73. Your Money or Your Life
Jared Schwartz Digital Print, 2019 Los Angeles, CA
Support Universal Healthcare So Nobody Has to Make that Choice. 09. Organizing for Health Justice
Health Care Not Wealth Care
74. What Would You Like
75. Our Rights = Our
to Be When You Grow Up? Alive! Photo: John Henebry, Jr. United Nation Children’s Fund Offset, Circa 1980s United States
Future Syracuse Cultural Workers Offset, 2002 Syracuse, NY
Each year 5 million children die and as many more are disabled by 6 diseases which can be prevented by vaccination: measles, tetanus, whooping cough, diphtheria, poliomyelitis and tuberculosis. The World Health Organization and UNICEF are helping to educate parents about the need to protect their children by immunizing them against these diseases. 09. Organizing for Health Justice
All children have a right to… love and security healthy food to eat a decent place to live adequate medical care be protected from abuse good education Health Care Not Wealth Care
Acknowledgements Health Care Not Wealth Care was an extraordinary collaborative effort. First and foremost, we thank the artists, cultural workers, activists, and organizations who produced the posters. Special thanks to everyone who saved the posters and donated them to CSPG so that future generations might learn from these powerful graphics.
Atelier Populaire Jon-Paul Bail Jesus Barraza Robert Birch Black Lives Matter Scott Braley Jan Brewer Barbara & Charles Brittin Carlos Callejo Francisco Moreno Capdevila Melanie Cervantes Elijah Childs Los Cinco Eva Cockcroft Paul Conrad Carlos Cortez Walter Cruz CultureStrike Lincoln Cushing Michael D’Antuono Tony DeRosa Design Action Collective Dignidad Rebelde
El Mac Emerson Fireworks Graphics Roberto Fuentes Vermont S. Galloway Stephen Gargan Martha & Leon Goldin Nora Hamilton Art Hazelwood Katarzyna Saskia Helińska Chris Hero Richard Hoover Inkworks Press Justseeds David Kunzle Mike Lee Walter Lippmann Dave Loewenstein Alejandro Magallanes Daniel Alonso Teresa Magaña Jill & Michael McCain Mary McGahren
Mark Rogovin Michelle Melin-Rogovin Doug Minkler Sheila Minsky Schatz David Monkawa Roque Montez Ricardo Levins Morales Alicia Nauta Northland Poster Collective Occuprint Mary Patten Roz Payne Peace Center Candace Peterson-Kahn Gary Phillips Rudy Pisani Queer Nation Ramsess Red Sun Press Bruce Reifel Cristy C. Road Favianna Rodriguez Rachael Romero
Millie Rosenstein Michael Rossman Salsedo Press San Francisco Poster Brigade Sandy Sanders Ellie & Jerome Schnitzer Dread Scott Kathie Sheldon & Steve Tarzynski Mary Sutton Taller Artes del Nuevo Amanecer Carol Thompson Mark Vallen Frans van Lier Vazta Birgit Walker Stephanie Weiner Mickey Wheatley Ann Wright Labiba Yasmin Josh Yoder
Thank you to CSPG’s interns, volunteers, and staff who are tireless in cataloguing, researching, writing, and editing: Mario Almaraz, Sherry Anapol, Daniel Alonso, Jonathan Arndt, Kevin Cervantes, Elizabeth Egel, Linda Esquivel, Gladys Garcia, Theodore T. Hajjar, Susan Henry, Nader Hotait, Lisa Kahn, Kate Kausch, Jessica Martinez, Lee Moonan, Yansi Murga, Olivia North, Kevin Pouldar, Alejandro Santander, Joseph Spir, Greg Verini, and Alyssa Young.
Special thanks to Lead Curator Carol A. Wells Community Curatorial Committee Erika Barbosa Cynthia Anderson-Barker Joanne Berlin Jorge Gonzalez Nancy Halpern Ibrahim Kwazi Nkrumah Samuel Paz Gary Phillips Catalogue Design Carl Guo Digital Catalogue Design Haley Vallejo Getty Intern
Translations Armida Corral Alejandra Gaeta Lee Moonan CSPG Staff Carol A. Wells Founder and Executive Director Alejandra Gaeta Archivist Emily Sulzer Archivist Erick Huerta Office and Social Media Manager
All reasonable attempts have been made to obtain permission for images reproduced in this catalogue. Please address any oversights to:
Center for the Study of Political Graphics 3916 Sepulveda Boulevard Suite 103, Culver City, CA 90230 www.politicalgraphics.org © 2020 Center for the Study of Political Graphics All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be used or reproduced in any manner without permission.