Mikaela Loach

Mikaela Loach is a British medical student and climate justice activist.

She was brought up in Surrey, living in Edinburgh, Scotland. She is a medical student at the University of Edinburgh who published a book and uses social media for campaigning, named as one of the Prospect top thinkers in 2024.

Alongside Jo Becker, Loach is the co-producer, writer and presenter of the Yikes podcast, which explores climate change, human rights and social justice. She is the author of the book It's Not That Radical: Climate Action to Transform Our World (2023).

Early life and education
Loach was born 1998 in Kingston Jamaica to a British father and Jamaican mother, and moved to Surrey, United Kingdom.

Campaigning
Loach advocates for environmental justice, racial justice, sustainable fashion, and human rights issues such as white supremacy and maltreatment of migrants. She also seeks to make the climate movement more inclusive and promoting 'active hope' and collective action, which extends to all 'emitting' industries and areas of cultural institutions and of event sponsorship.

During part of 2019 Extinction Rebellion climate crisis protests in London, Loach locked-on for eight hours in an attempt to prevent police clearing a site. She also campaigns with Climate Camp Scotland. She was a speaker at Zurich Insurance Group's Youth Against Carbon Conference. In 2020, Loach created the Yikes podcast with Jo Becker.

In December 2021, Loach took part in a Judicial Review alongside other activists, to challenge the UK Government's oil and gas strategy. In January 2022, the High Court found against the activists, stating the case had "no basis in the statute". But her 'Stop Oil' campaigning continues and has an impact on young activists. A related campaign Loach engages in is against fast fashion and supply chains bringing the physical, environmental damage and human rights issues together, and attempts to improve advice and practices in the market, and has concerns about the hidden emissions from buildings. She was one of the authors who disrupted the Edinburgh International Book Festival in 2024, in relation to sponsorship concerns. Loach sees the various campaigns as integrated, like 'mycelia' a network of fungi, linking trees in a forest, unseen but influential.

Publications

 * It's Not That Radical: Climate Action to Transform Our World. London: DK, 2023. ISBN 978-0241597538.