The People’s Health Alliance and Health Hubs

Mark Freeman

A new decentralised health organisation in New Zealand aims to “bring health back to the people.”

The People’s Health Alliance (PHA) was started in the United Kingdom last year in response to the government’s Covid response, including vaccine mandates for health professionals. The initiative spread to about thirty other countries and was started in New Zealand in July by Alexia Montague, an Alexander Technique teacher, and Rachel Shields, an NLP master practitioner.

The initiative is an “organic, people-led approach to healthcare, bringing everything back to community level”. It’s an “integrative health care model” that focuses on creating health rather than treating disease and aims to empower people to take responsibility for their own health.

The coordinators of the PHA New Zealand say there has been an “amazing response” to the initiative in this country. There are now 20 health hubs nationwide at various stages of development operating under the umbrella of the organisation. The PHA NZ has 1470 members, mostly practitioners – alternative therapists, nurses and doctors.

The health system is broken; Rachel Shields says people’s choices in health care are being taken away and treatment delayed. Under the health mandates, alternative practitioners, doctors and nurses have been unable to work. “If we don’t look after and support those healers, alternative therapists and allopathic practitioners within our community, we’re going to lose them.”

The hubs and their practitioners are separate from the PHA. Rachel says, “We don’t tell the hubs what to do. The whole point of the PHA is to get the people to think for themselves.”

She describes the PHA as a parallel health system rather than an alternative system. One of its purposes is to “take the pressure off the current system and provide services that would otherwise be lost.”

The health hub model is also facilitating communities to come together around other issues such as food, education and mental health, she says. “We’re easing people into the possibilities of creating what they want. What are the needs of the community? Let’s meet those needs.”

One of the PHA health hubs is in Wellington, where the Brooklyn Wellness Hub recently held its first open day. Services offered by its practitioners include foot reflexology and massage, osteopathy, orthobionomy, balms, counselling and traditional health checks.

Spokesperson Suzanne Harris, a former registered nurse, says the hub’s vision is to look after the health of people in the Wellington freedom community and residents in the suburbs of Brooklyn and Kingston.

The Brooklyn Wellness Hub is a private members’ association, meaning it doesn’t have to follow government health regulations. The hub is operating within the law but “out of the matrix”.

Some people no longer trust the national health system. She notes, “I had one lady who was seriously vax-injured, and we’re going to help her. She’s been in hospital several times and has had no help. I believe we can get her immune system back to fighting disease naturally. People need to know there’s an alternative. We’re for the people, by the people.”