A Healthy Society, Updated and Expanded Edition

A Healthy Society now includes chapters on poverty, food security, and climate change. Thought-provoking and highly readable, it weaves together the vision of a young politician--Meili was elected leader of the Saskatchewan NDP in March 2018--and the advocacy of a good physician who has worked in rural and urban Saskatchewan and in Africa. Dr. Fiona Clement, director of the Health Technology Assessment Unit at the O'Brien Institute of Public Health, University of Calgary, Alberta Views, Vol. 21, No. 9

What do you get when an empathetic physician combines stories, concern for his community, and analysis? This special book. Ryan Meili goes from patient to society, and from social and political forces to the patient. If this book’s insights were put into practice, we would get a healthy society indeed. Michael Marmot, director of UCL Institute of Health Equity and author of The Health Gap

Meili speaks from experience, from the heart, and with passion for achieving social justice. His political insight in how to achieve prosperity for all citizens and society is creative and revolutionary. Louise Simard, former Saskatchewan minister of health and minister responsible for the status of women

Understanding health means understanding society. Ryan Meili is a physician who understands both. This book is passionate, very readable, and gives the whole system a major push toward a better future. Richard Wilkinson, co-author of The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better

Physicians have traditionally sought to cure the ailing patient. Why are you not well? How can we make you well again? In this thoughtful and inspiring book, Ryan Meili takes this same approach to what ails us as a society. The perspective is holistic, novel, and necessary. If you want to know how we’ll get to a better future for all, then you must read this book. Yann Martel, author of The Life of Pi, winner of the Man Booker Prize

Dr. Meili’s focus on health and its social determinants to drive social and political change is powerful. This book is written with clarity, centred on stories, and informed by years of experience as a family doctor and public policy reformer. Canadians would do well to heed its call to action to deepen our democracy through a focus on health. Danyaal Raza, chair of Canadian Doctors for Medicare

It is a huge privilege to be allowed into people’s individual stories as a family doctor, to come face to face with their most private fears and challenges. To do so while seeing the bigger picture, learning what can be generalized from each story, is the finest way to honour one’s patients. The first edition of A Healthy Society brought upstream thinking to the mainstream, showing Canadians how a health lens could help us tackle our greatest challenges. The combination of story, evidence, and vision for the future in this latest edition is what we need to chart a path to a healthier Canada. Danielle Martin, author of Better Now: Six Big Ideas to Improve Health Care for All Canadians

A vivid portrait of the adverse effects of current public policy directions upon the health of Canadians … this volume is more timely than ever. Dennis Raphael, professor of health policy and management at York University and editor of Social Determinants of Health: Canadian Perspectives

Collected in this book are stories most Canadians don’t get to hear – stories that show that Canada can, and must, be a more compassionate country. A Healthy Society should be required reading for those tasked with crafting policy in this country, those pushing for a more caring Canada, and those interested in evidence-based decision-making. Max Fineday, executive director of Canadian Roots Exchange