Placement: Boston College and Brown University
Co-Mentors: Phil Landrigan, MD, MSc, Professor of Biology, Director, Program for Global Public Health and the Common Good, and Director, Global Observatory on Planetary Health, Boston College
Stefanie Friedhoff, Associate Professor of the Practice of Health Services, Policy and Practice, Interim Director of the Information Futures Lab, Brown University
Project: Health Policy Reform in an Era of Polarization
Lucinda Hiam, BMedSci, MBChB, MPH, MRCGP, DFSRH, HonMFPH, is a 2025–26 U.K. Harkness Fellow in Health Care Policy and Practice. A family medicine doctor and public health specialist, she has 15 years of experience across clinical medicine, global health, and health policy. In addition to her work in the UK’s National Health Service, Hiam has held roles with the World Health Organization, Médecins Sans Frontières, Primary Care International, and Doctors of the World UK, with a focus on health equity, migrant health, and strengthening primary care in humanitarian and low-resource settings.
Hiam is a Clarendon Scholar and DPhil candidate at the University of Oxford, where her research explores deteriorating health outcomes in the UK and their links to austerity. She has a broader interest in how political and economic decisions shape population health and has published widely on the social and political determinants of health, austerity-related mortality trends, migrant health, and health policy reform. She also serves as a commissioner on the British Medical Journal’s Future of the NHS Commission. Her contributions have been recognized with honorary membership of the UK Faculty of Public Health, the BMJ’s “Get Up Stand Up” Award, and an NHS Parliamentary Award for her team’s outreach work during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Project Overview: In both the U.S. and U.K., political polarization has made health policy reform increasingly difficult, even as health outcomes decline and inequities grow. Yet some reforms have succeeded despite public and political opposition, often by using compelling narratives to build support across divides. This project will examine how such narrative strategies have been used in the U.S. and explore how similar approaches could support reforms in the U.K.’s National Health Service.
Through case studies, interviews, and media analysis, the project will identify how successful health reforms in polarized contexts have framed health as a human right, a matter of security, or a shared social value. Findings will inform recommendations and tools for policymakers seeking to advance equitable health policy in contentious environments. Insights will be relevant not only to U.K. debates on NHS reform but also to other U.S. states navigating similar political challenges.