Street medic

Street medics, or action medics, are volunteers with varying degrees of medical training who attend protests and demonstrations to provide medical care such as first aid. Unlike emergency medical technicians (EMTs), who work for state-sponsored institutions, street medics operate as civilians and are not protected from arrest.

Street medic organizations also run low-income herbal health clinics, wellness clinics for migrant workers, and temporary family practice clinics to support people who are organizing for self-defense or advocating for their rights. A group of street medics founded the first health clinic to open in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.

Street medics work under the philosophy of "do no harm," meaning that medics use treatments that must never harm the patient more than they help. Because different medics have different levels of training, they will be able to provide different types of care. Street medic organizations in different cities or regions plan training programs that focus on treating demonstration-related injuries and plan medical coverage of upcoming demonstrations.

Sometimes an affinity group will include one or more trained street medics to attend specifically to members of that group.

Many street medics have pursued further medical training, most commonly in nursing, emergency medicine, and herbalism. There are street medics employed in almost every field of medicine and rescue, including surgery, family practice medicine, psychiatry, research, both classical and traditional Chinese medicine, medical herbalism, first aid instruction, fire-fighting, and wilderness medicine.