Category: GH Announcements
Apply to be a CUGH Campus Representative for BU! Applications due July 20th.
In an effort to engage and mobilize the voices of local student groups involved in global health, the Trainee Advisory Committee (TAC) of the Consortium of Universities for Global Health (CUGH) is announcing a call for nominations of one Campus Representative from each CUGH member institution. With the goal of eliciting input from the broader trainee community, TAC is seeking Campus Representatives that will act as the liaison between TAC and the global health student body at their university. This Representative will be pivotal in reaching out to groups active in global health at their institution in order to build a larger network of trainees for collaboration. The following describes the role of the Campus Representative:
Obligations of a Campus Representative:
1. Be a liaison between your on-campus global health trainee activities and CUGH TAC.
2. Share CUGH TAC information and projects with students interested in global health.
3. Gather local students’ feedback about the roles of CUGH and TAC in global health and any modifications that may be warranted.
4. Provide ideas for solutions to various global health issues and student specific problems.
5. Represent the voice of global health students from your member institution.
6. Create and maintain a list of contacts of students and/or student groups interested in global health to facilitate information dissemination.
7. Work on advocacy projects in collaboration with the CUGH TAC.
Benefits of a campus representative:
1. Be the face of one of the biggest global health organizations to your campus.
2. Possible involvement in organizing Global Health topic webinar series, either content-related or promotional activities.
3. Network with students and professionals in global health on your campus and beyond.
4. Access to the CUGH Young Speaker Bureau.
5. If your institution is not a CUGH member, each Campus Representative can join CUGH as an individual member with the membership fee waived during the service term.
If you are interested in representing Boston University in this capacity, please submit your application as follows. We will nominate one student from the BU Medical Campus who clearly represents the values of BU and CUGH. Decisions will be made by July 25.
CUGH Campus Representative Nomination Application
Tell us why you should be the Boston University campus nominee! Please complete this form by 5:00pm, Wednesday, July 20 to be considered.
Professor Chris Gill awarded Metcalf Cup and Prize
A physician specializing in infectious diseases, Christopher Gill calls himself “a clinician first,” but students are currently among the beneficiaries of his work on global public health problems. An associate professor of global health at the School of Public Health and a research scientist at BU’s Center for Global Health & Development, Gill treats his students more as colleagues, demanding a high level of dedication and professionalism, even as he engages them with his wit and wide-ranging war stories.
ASC Offers Course for Public Health Students
Boston University’s African Studies Center (ASC), an affiliated center of the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, piloted a Swahili language course designed for Masters of Public Health candidates during the Spring 2016 semester, and students discussed the benefits of the course as well as the close the ties between the School of Public Health and the African Studies Center.
The class, Swahili With a Health Focus (CAS LE491), emphasizes Swahili language useful in conducting fieldwork and surveys, as well as cultural specific notions of health.
Jennifer Beard, Assistant Professor of Global Health, took the class this semester, and said the African Studies Center provides a link for faculty and students at the Medical Campus to colleagues on the Charles River Campus with similar research areas.
Students Receive African Language Fellowships
“My heart was left in Senegal,” says Faith Umoh. After two years there with the Peace Corps, she returned to the US last spring to pursue an MPH at the School of Public Health—and discovered a way to stay connected to Senegal and Wolof, its main language, at the same time.
PH825: Analysis of Emerging Infections Using the One Health Approach
Don't miss out on course PH825 this fall taught by one of our Department of Global Health faculty David Hamer and Department of Environmental Health professor Jean M. van Seventer.
For more information see the course description and video below. There is still time to register on student link!
This class employs One Health, an approach to public health emphasizing the interconnectedness of human health, animal health, and the environment, to provide a basic understanding of factors involved in the natural history of emerging infectious diseases (EIDs), and of approaches required for the control and prevention of these diseases. The number of reported EIDs has been steadily increased over past decades and while the global burden of individual diseases is often minimal, historically, some EIDs (e.g., HIV, influenza, chikungunya, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA)) have had enormous global public health impact, and local impacts can often be quite severe, particularly in developing settings (e.g., Ebola in West Africa). The majority of EIDs are vector-borne and/or zoonotic, and a wide range of social, behavioral, and physical environmental factors contribute to their emergence, making the One Health approach crucial to understanding these diseases. In this class, case study of specific EIDs is used to illustrate the involvement of multiple factors in disease emergence and spread. Emphasis is placed on understanding the natural history and pathogenesis of these EIDs, and the laboratory methods commonly used for their diagnosis and surveillance. At the conclusion of the course, students will be able to apply the principles they have learned to analyze and determine the factors involved in the new emergence or re-emergence of an infectious disease; knowledge which is ultimately essential for determining appropriate disease control and prevention strategies.
Spring 2016 SSG Emphasis Area Meeting
Please join the sex, sexuality, gender and health emphasis area for our Spring 2016 meeting. We plan to meet on Thursday, April 14 from 1:00 - 2:00 in Crosstown 386. The focus of the meeting is to organize a panel on global LGBT health for the Fall 2016 semester. Send questions to Professor Messersmith at ljmesser@bu.edu or Nick Diamond at njd15@bu.edu. Hope to see you there!
Fellow BUSPH student reports on FGM in Mali, publishes in the Guardian
BU MPH candidate Kateri Donahoe was selected as one of three student fellows to receive the Program for Global Health Storytelling's Pulitzer Center fellowship. Kateri spent part of her 2015 summer in Mali conducting research and interviews on female genital cutting.
Her work was published yesterday in the Guardian. Congratulations, Kateri!
Female genital cutting affects more than nine out of ten of women in Mali. Those working to end the practice must walk a fine line between preserving culture and protecting women.
Article: Evaluating availability and price of essential medicines in Boston area (Massachusetts, USA) using WHO/HAI methodology
Two of the article's authors, Abhishek Sharma and Lindsey Rorden, are BUSPH alumni. Author Richard Laing is a Professor in the Department of Global Health.
Abstract
Background:
Many patients even those with health insurance pay out-of-pocket for medicines. We investigated the availability and prices of essential medicines in the Boston area.
Methods:
Using the WHO/HAI methodology, availability and undiscounted price data for both originator brand (OB) and lowest price generic (LPG) equivalent versions of 25 essential medicines (14 prescription; 11 over-thecounter (OTC)) were obtained from 17 private pharmacies. The inclusion and prices of 26 essential medicines in seven pharmacy discount programs were also studied. The medicine prices were compared with international reference prices (IRPs).
Results:
In surveyed pharmacies, the OB medicines were less available as compared to the generics. The OB and LPG versions of OTC medicines were 21.33 and 11.53 times the IRP, respectively. The median prices of prescription medicines were higher, with OB and LPG versions at 158.14 and 38.03 times the IRP, respectively. In studied pharmacy discount programs, the price ratios of surveyed medicines varied from 4.4–13.9.
Conclusions:
While noting the WHO target that consumers should pay no more than four times the IRPs, medicine prices were considerably higher in the Boston area. The prices for medicines included in the pharmacy discount programs were closest to WHO’s target. Consumers should shop around, as medicine inclusion and prices vary across discount programs. In order for consumers to identify meaningful potential savings through comparison shopping, price transparency is needed.
Global Health 811: Applied Research Methods
GH811 is a recently developed course focused on data science methods for global health. The class is hands-on and will equip students with practical skills that employers are looking for. This course is open to all students who’ve taken both introductory biostatistics and epidemiology (EP713 and BS704).
Course Overview
In this course we focus on building skills in data, tools and methods for carrying out global health research. The class will introduce you to all stages of the research pipeline, from asking interesting questions to conducting a literature review, data collection, analysis, crafting an effective research paper and communicating results.
See the following two links for more information about the course: http://sites.bu.edu/gh811/
Contact Andrew Stokes with questions or for more information.
