Wellcome Collection and Profile pre-empt Sowemimo's 'illuminating' title

Wellcome Collection and Profile Books have acquired Decolonising Healthcare, a "vital, eye-opening history of race and health", by Dr Annabel Sowemimo.

Wellcome Collection assistant editor Ellen Johl bought world rights (including audio) in a pre-empt from Milly Reilly at the Jo Unwin Literary Agency. Decolonising Healthcare will be published in 2022.

Sowemimo is a sexual and reproductive health doctor, journalist and founder of community-based organisation Decolonising Contraception. 

In Decolonising Healthcare, Sowemimo will unravel the colonial roots of modern medicine: she will also tackle systemic racism, hidden histories, healthcare myths and recount her own experiences as a doctor, patient and activist.  

Johl said: "Annabel Sowemimo is incredibly impressive – as a doctor, writer and activist – and I couldn’t be more thrilled that the Wellcome Collection will be the home for her essential and searingly truthful book. Decolonising Healthcare will expose the racial biases of medicine that affect our everyday lives and provides an illuminating – and incredibly necessary – insight into how our world works, and who it works for."

Sowemimo added: "The effects of colonialism on our medical institutions has not just become urgent due to the health disparities we have witnessed through Covid-19 nor due to the light shone on racial inequalities due to the Black Lives Matter movement – it has always been urgent. I have felt the urgency since I was in medical school. It’s a privilege to be trusted to write something that has the potential to reshape how some see medicine. It’s mind blowing that Profile Books and the Wellcome Collection – whose work has continually inspired me – will be the home for this project."

Photo credit: Verona Rose Photography