Health Equity in 2025

What We Learned, What We Need Next

As 2025 draws to a close, it's worth pausing to reflect on what the past year has taught us about health equity — and where we still need to go.

It’s been a year of urgency and momentum. We’ve seen more conversations about justice, access, and wellbeing across healthcare, public health, and policy. But we’ve also seen the consequences of inaction, burnout, and widening gaps.

Here’s what stood out — and what we should carry forward.

1. Equity Is No Longer Optional

From cost-of-living crises to climate health impacts, it’s clearer than ever that health systems must be designed to protect the most vulnerable.

Equity isn’t a side project. It’s a foundation for resilience.

2. Listening Is a Skill, Not a Slogan

More organisations made space for lived experience this year — but real listening means more than consultation. It means shifting who holds decision-making power and responding with action.

Tokenism and extractive practices won’t get us where we need to be.

3. Community-Led Models Work

Across the UK and globally, we’ve seen powerful results when care is co-designed, community-run, or peer-led. These models are:

• Culturally relevant

• More trusted

• Often more sustainable

They should no longer be the exception.

4. Wellbeing of Advocates Matters

There’s growing recognition that the people leading equity work — often from marginalised backgrounds themselves — need support, not just celebration.

Rest, recognition, and redistribution of labour must be part of any sustainable equity agenda.

What We Need Next

Looking to 2026, here’s what I hope we focus on:

• Embedding equity into everyday practice, not just policy

• Funding prevention and upstream care

• Creating safer, more inclusive spaces at all levels of healthcare

• Making space for innovation and disruption from communities

The energy is there. The challenge is maintaining momentum without burning out.

My Reflection

This year, I’ve spoken in rooms I never imagined, connected with communities I continue to learn from, and shared platforms with brilliant changemakers.

What stays with me most is the shared commitment to reimagining care as something rooted in trust, dignity, and justice.

Final Thoughts

As we move into a new year, let’s not settle for surface-level inclusion or piecemeal reform. Let’s build the kind of health systems we’d want for the people we love.

Not perfect. But fair, responsive, and human.