As many of you know I recently have spent a prolonged period in NHS hospitals having major surgery and other treatments. If anyone has been a patient in the NHS you soon become aware how much we depend on staff born outside of the UK who have chosen to make their home here and use their skills to help the NHS.

However, we live in strange times. After 30 years of being an open confident country happy to be a home for talented people from around the world the UK appears to have recently become more xenophobic. Television news can go to a rundown seaside town find a retired couple who will happily give an interview stating immigration must be stopped. This is lazy journalism as there is no balancing view showing the essential work done by people who have come to the UK. This has lead to many non-UK born colleagues feeling insecure.

Sadly there is parallel to this in the 1930s. At this time the world’s problems was blamed on different ethnic groups or immigration. At its worse it occurred in Germany but people forget similar feeling were present in the UK. It is said that for evil to succeed is for good people to do nothing. This was best described by Dietrich Bonhoeffer when he wrote about what happened in Nazi Germany

“First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists, but I was neither, so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew so I did not speak out. And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me”.

I was taught nuclear medicine by teachers who came from Germany and Portugal so my career was formed by those who chose to come to the UK. For many of our BNMS members that is also true. Our whole specialty is dependent on those born overseas. However, I am not just stating a fact but I am immensely proud to be a President of a Society that represents highly trained colleagues who have chosen to make this country their home and work for the NHS. So I ask all of you to not be passive but when we come across xenophobic comments not to be silent but state clearly and strongly how we celebrate the diverse people from around the globe who come and serve our patients in this wonderful nuclear medicine community.

Dr John Buscombe

BNMS President