Harvard Global Health Institute’s Inaugural Global Health Symposium
Global Health Equity Through Community Engagement
Wednesday, April 12th, 2023
This event is being hosted in a hybrid format, and while in person capacity is limited,
we encourage you to register to join us via zoom webinar.
SYMPOSIUM AGENDA
8:30am – 9:00am | Welcome and Registration (for in person attendees)
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9:00am – 9:15am | Welcome Remarks
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Alan M. Garber, MD, PhD
Provost Alan M. Garber serves as Harvard University’s chief academic officer. He is also the Mallinckrodt Professor of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School, a Professor of Economics in the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Professor of Public Policy in the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and Professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management in the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. An economist and physician, he studies methods for improving health care productivity and health care financing. Before becoming Provost at Harvard in 2011, Dr. Garber was the Henry J. Kaiser Jr. Professor and a Professor of Medicine, as well as a Professor of Economics, Health Research and Policy, and Economics in the Graduate School of Business (by courtesy) at Stanford University. At Stanford, he founded and directed the Center for Health Policy and the Center for Primary Care and Outcomes Research, and served as a Staff Physician at the Department of Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System. A summa cum laude graduate of Harvard College, Dr. Garber received a PhD in Economics from Harvard and an MD with research honors from Stanford.
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9:20am – 9:50am | Global Health Security: Africa’s New Public Health Order
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Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, MD, BDS, MPH, MPhil
Dr. Ahmed Ogwell OUMA is currently the Acting Director of Africa CDC. He is also the founding Deputy Director, and, in these roles, he has led the strategic work and oversight of Africa CDC. He works closely with African Union Member States and partners to deliver on the mandate of Africa CDC of preventing and controlling diseases in Africa. Ahmed has led the operations of Africa CDC during the COVID-19 pandemic, coordinating the planning, acquisition, and delivery of life-saving health products to African countries including test kits, personal protective materials, therapeutics, and vaccines. Formerly, he worked with the WHO at both the HQs and Regional Office for Africa, in combating NCDs & tobacco control. Prior to that, Dr. Ahmed worked at country level in the Ministry of Health, Kenya, as Director for NCDs and then Head of the Office for International Health Relations. He has been at the forefront of advocacy and action to reform the health system in Africa including the need to establish an efficient & effective response mechanism for disease threats and health emergencies. He has over 25 years’ experience in public health and is an alumnus of the University of Nairobi in Kenya and the University of Bergen in Norway.
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9:55am – 10:40am | The Value of Planetary Health to Global Health Equity
Hosted in partnership with the Planetary Health Alliance
Humanity’s footprint on Earth’s natural systems is changing our environment and affecting all dimensions of health including non-communicable disease, malnutrition, infectious disease, mental health, and exacerbating challenges around displacement and conflict. In short, the Earth Crisis is causing a global health and humanitarian crisis. Understanding and acting upon these urgent challenges call for massive collaboration across disciplinary and national boundaries to safeguard our health. Planetary Health is a solutions-oriented, transdisciplinary field and social movement focused on analyzing and addressing the impacts of human disruptions to Earth’s natural systems on human health and all life on Earth. In this session, leaders from three unique global health domains will speak to the value of the Planetary Health frame in addressing the health and development needs of the world’s most vulnerable populations.
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Mandeep Dhaliwal, MD
Dr. Mandeep Dhaliwal is the Director of United Nations Development Programme’s HIV, Health and Development Group. Dr. Dhaliwal brings to the organization over 20 years of experience working on HIV, health, human rights and evidence-based policy and programming in low-and middle- income countries. Dr. Dhaliwal, a physician and lawyer, joined UNDP in 2008 as the Cluster Leader: Human Rights, Gender and Sexual Diversities in the HIV/AIDS Group. She was the architect and lead for the Global Commission on HIV and the Law which UNDP convened on behalf of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS. Prior to joining UNDP, she was a senior adviser to the Dutch Royal Tropical Institute’s Special Programme on HIV/AIDS and the lead on HIV care and treatment at the International HIV/AIDS Alliance. -
Courtney Howard, MD
Dr. Courtney Howard is an Emergency Physician in Yellowknife, in Canada’s subarctic, and a Clinical Associate Professor in the Cumming School of Medicine at the University of Calgary. She is a nationally- and globally-recognized expert on health sector engagement with climate change and with the broader field of planetary health. She was the first author on the 2017-2019 Lancet Countdown on Health and Climate Change Briefings for Canadian Policymakers as well as being the 2018 International Policy Director for the Lancet Countdown on Health and Climate Change. Dr Howard is on the steering committee of the Planetary Health Alliance and the editorial advisory boards of the Lancet Planetary Health and the Journal of Climate Change and Health. Dr Howard was the first woman to be president of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE), and represents CAPE on the communications and advocacy subcommittee of the WHO Civil Society Working Group on Climate Change and Health. She is on the board of the Canadian Medical Association and the advisory board of Health in Harmony, and is a 2022-23 Master of Public Policy Candidate at the Blavatnik School of Government at Oxford University. -
Jemilah Mahmood, MD, MO&G
Dr. Jemilah Mahmood is a Professor of Planetary Health at Sunway University in Malaysia and the Executive Director of the Sunway Centre for Planetary Health. A medical professional with more than two decades of experience managing health crises in disasters and conflict settings, her previous appointments include: Under Secretary General for Partnerships at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC); Chief of the World Humanitarian Summit secretariat at the United Nations; and Chief of the Humanitarian Response Branch at the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). In 2020, she was appointed a Senior Fellow of the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Centre. She was also the Special Advisor to the Prime Minister of Malaysia on Public Health, a member of the Government of Malaysia’s Economic Action Council and Climate Action Council, and most notably the founder of MERCY Malaysia, a Southern-based international humanitarian organization. Dr. Mahmood has received numerous international and national awards, including the ASEAN Award in 2019, the Merdeka Award in 2015, and the prestigious Isa Award for Services to Humanity in 2013 from the Kingdom of Bahrain, often referred to as the “Nobel peace prize equivalent in the Gulf”. -
Samuel Myers, MD, MPH
Samuel Myers, MD, MPH studies the human health impacts of accelerating disruptions to Earth’s natural systems, a field recently dubbed Planetary Health. He is a Principal Research Scientist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and is the founding Director of the Planetary Health Alliance. As the Director of the Planetary Health Alliance, Sam oversees a multi-institutional effort (over 350 organizations in over 65 countries) focused on understanding and quantifying the human health impacts of disrupting Earth’s natural systems and translating that understanding into resource management decisions globally. Dr. Myers was the inaugural recipient of the Arrell Global Food Innovation Award in 2018 and Prince Albert II of Monaco prize in 2015 for his research at the interface of health and environment. He is the co-editor with Howard Frumkin of "Planetary Health: Protecting Nature to Protect Ourselves" published in August 2020, and he has authored over 100 peer reviewed articles and book chapters. Sam received his BA from Harvard College, MD from Yale University School of Medicine, and MPH from the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. He performed his internal medicine residency at UCSF and is Board Certified in Internal Medicine. -
Daniel P. Schrag, PhD
Daniel P. Schrag is the Sturgis Hooper Professor of Geology at Harvard University, Professor of Environmental Science and Engineering, and Director of the Harvard University Center for the Environment. Dr. Schrag studies climate and climate change over the broadest range of Earth history. He is particularly interested in how information on climate change from the geologic past can lead to better understanding of anthropogenic climate change in the future. In addition to his work on geochemistry and climatology, Dr. Schrag studies energy technology and policy, including carbon capture and storage and low-carbon synthetic fuels. From 2009-2017, Dr. Schrag served on President Obama’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. Among various honors, he is the recipient of the James B. Macelwane Medal from the American Geophysical Union and a MacArthur Fellowship. Dr. Schrag earned a B.S. in geology and geophysics and political science from Yale University and his Ph.D. in geology from the University of California at Berkeley. He came to Harvard in 1997 after teaching at Princeton.
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10:45am – 11:15am | Organizing Social Movements to Change Abortion Regulations
A conversation with Ana Cristina González Vélez
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Ana Cristina González Vélez, MA, MD, PhD
Ana Cristina González-Vélez is a Colombian Medical Doctor with over 25 years’ experience and a 2022-023 Harvard LEAD Fellow. She holds a master's degree in Social Research in Health as well as a PhD in Bioethics, Applied Ethics and Collective Health. Dr. González is a renowned international expert and leader in the field of health and sexual and reproductive rights, the right to health, and gender equality. She has held several positions across the spectrum of her profession: as a service provider, policy formulator, researcher, international advisor, activist and teacher on the right to health in the Faculty of Medicine at Universidad de los Andes. Dr. González is the former national public health director in Colombia and co-founder of La Mesa por la Vida y la Salud de las Mujeres and the Medical Group for The Right to Decide in Colombia. She pioneered the Causa Justa movement of Colombia that established the most liberal abortion law in Latin America and the Caribbean. She is also part of the regional coalition “Articulación Feminista Marcosur”, was included as one of 100 most influential people in the TIME100 list of 2022, and was also elected one of the Characters of the Year in Colombia by El Espectador and El Tiempo. -
Alicia Ely Yamin, JD, MPH, PhD (Moderater)
Alicia Ely Yamin, JD, MPH, PhD, is a Lecturer on Law and Senior Fellow on Global Health and Rights at the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy and Biotechnology at Harvard Law School, and a Senior Advisor on Human Rights and Health Policy at Partners in Health. Yamin is known globally for both her work on women’s health and rights-based approaches to health. In 2012, Yamin was the lead drafter/consultant for the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights on the first inter-governmentally approved guidance on a human rights-based approach to health. In 2016, the UN Secretary General appointed Yamin as one of ten international global health experts to the Independent Accountability Panel for the Global Strategy on Women's, Children’s, and Adolescents' Health in the Sustainable Development Goals, for which she was re-appointed in 2018. For decades, Yamin has contributed to the work of multiple human rights treaty-monitoring bodies on sexual and reproductive health, UN Special Procedures, as well as to multiple expert groups at the World Health Organization (WHO) related to sexual and reproductive health, health systems and health workforce. Yamin also has deep experience conducting public health research and implementation experience regarding maternal health and sexual and reproductive health.
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11:15am – 11:30am | Break
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11:35am – 12:05pm | Challenging the Status Quo for Our Sustainable Future: Promoting Health, Equity, and Resilience
A conversation with Winnie Byanyima
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Winnie Byanyima, MS
Winnie Byanyima is the Executive Director of UNAIDS and an Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations. A passionate and longstanding champion of social justice issues and gender equality, Ms Byanyima leads the United Nations’ efforts to end the AIDS pandemic by 2030. Ms Byanyima believes that health care is a human right, and she is the co-founder and co-chair of the People’s Vaccine Alliance, advocating for COVID-19 vaccines and treatments to be available and free of charge to everyone, everywhere. Before joining UNAIDS, Ms Byanyima served as the Executive Director of Oxfam International, and she was elected for three terms in the parliament of her country, Uganda. -
Vanessa Kerry, MD, MS (Moderater)
Vanessa Kerry, MD, MSc, is a physician at Mass General Hospital and the director of the Program in Global Public Policy and Social Change in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Kerry is the founder and CEO of Seed Global Health, a non-profit that strengthens health systems by investing in health professionals in resource limited settings and ensures the resilience of those systems to address the many health burdens they face today and might tomorrow. She serves as the Associate Director of Partnerships and Global Initiatives at the Mass General Center for Global Health where she is also a practicing intensive care physician. Dr. Kerry is on the Editorial Board of New England Journal of Medicine Evidence and Annals of Global Health. She is a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She was recently appointed to the President’s Council for International Activities at Yale University, as a Global Advisor to the Wellbeing Foundation Africa and on the Board at University of Global Health Equity. She is the mother of a seven- and ten- year old.
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12:10pm – 12:55pm | Advancing Equitable Partnerships in Global Health: Building Upon a Decades-Long HIV Response
Over the past 3 decades, the global community collaborated on a massive expansion of HIV diagnosis, care, treatment and prevention programs; scientific and research capacity and investigation; and community engagement around HIV. While much work remains to be done in HIV and not all communities benefited equally from these investments, 75% of people living with HIV globally are taking antiretroviral therapy, AIDS-related deaths have been reduced by 68% since the peak in 2004, and new HIV infections reduced by 54% since 1996. In this panel, we will discuss how partnerships that were created to address HIV can address other public health issues, and other lessons learned. For example, what are some the multi-faceted benefits and challenges of these partnerships? How should they be established and evolve, with equity as a guiding principle?
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Linda-Gail Bekker, MBChB, DTMH, DCH, FCP, FCP(SA), PhD
Linda-Gail Bekker is the Director of the Desmond Tutu HIV Centre at the Institute of Infectious Disease and Molecular Medicine, University of Cape Town, and Chief Executive Officer of the Desmond Tutu Health Foundation. She is a physician-scientist and infectious disease specialist. Her research interests include programmatic and action research around antiretroviral roll out, tuberculosis integration and prevention of HIV in women, young people and men who have sex with men. Linda-Gail has also recently been involved in COVID-19 vaccine trials and co-leads the Sisonke Phase 3B study, which has seen the vaccination of 500,000 healthcare workers in South Africa. She has led numerous investigator-driven studies on HIV treatment, prevention and tuberculosis. She is a Past President of the International AIDS Society and served as the International Co-Chair of IAS 2017, the 9th IAS Conference on HIV Science, and AIDS 2018. She was Co-Chair of HIVR4P 2020 // Virtual, the 4th HIV Research for Prevention Conference, held in January 2021. -
Phyllis Kanki, DVM, DSc
Phyllis Kanki, DVM, DSc has been a professor of Immunology and Infectious Disease at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health since 1999. Her research centers on the virology, pathogenesis and molecular epidemiology of HIV and related infections in Africa. Based on long term research collaborations in Senegal for over 24 years, her work provided the initial characterization of HIV-2, demonstrated reduced virulence, transmission and progression to disease and interactions with HIV-1 subtypes from West Africa. In 2000, Dr. Kanki created and directed the AIDS Prevention Initiative in Nigeria (APIN), with a $25 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. This provided the collaborative foundation for the Harvard President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) providing prevention, care and HIV antiretroviral therapy in Nigeria, Botswana, and Tanzania (2004-2012). To date, in addition to the capacity building for clinical, laboratory and research capabilities, the program has provided treatment for over 200,000 AIDS patients. Currently, she is studying arbovirus infection in pregnant women including Zika, dengue and Chikungunya viruses and the immune responses to SARS-CoV-2 in healthcare workers in Nigeria. She is an honorary faculty member at the University of Ibadan and University of Jos in Nigeria. -
Shahin Lockman, MD, MS
Dr. Lockman is an infectious-disease trained clinician and has led clinical investigation related to HIV in collaboration with colleagues in Botswana since 1996. One of her research focus areas is the safety and efficacy of antiretroviral drugs used for HIV treatment and prevention among pregnant and postpartum women, including through clinical trials in pregnancy and studies of neurodevelopment and health of antiretroviral-exposed children. She is joint PI of the Botswana Clinical Trials Unit at the Botswana Harvard AIDS Institute Partnership, which conducts ACTG, IMPAACT, HPTN, and CoVPN network trials, and co-chairs working groups led by the World Health Organization that focus on accelerating ethical research of new HIV agents during pregnancy and breastfeeding. Dr. Lockman mentors early-career investigators from Botswana and the region (and the US) on a range of clinical research projects in Botswana. -
Maureen Luba, BA
Maureen Luba is a Program Manager at Cooper Smith, where she expertly oversees the "Data for Action" project funded by the Gates Foundation whose objective is to enhance the health systems and service delivery in Malawi through cutting-edge technology and solutions and availability of real-time data for informed decision-making. Prior to her role at Cooper Smith, Maureen was a senior program manager at Global Advocacy for HIV Prevention (AVAC), where she led the capacity-building efforts of Civil Society Organizations in Zimbabwe, Tanzania, and Malawi. Through her guidance, these organizations were empowered to take an active role in shaping key policies and processes, including those of the Global Fund, PEPFAR, and national policy-making. Maureen is a Global Health LEAD Fellow of 2019 and holds a Bachelor's degree in Public Administration. Currently, she is pursuing a Master's degree in Global Health Delivery at Harvard Medical School, further solidifying her expertise in the field. -
Mosepele Mosepele, MD, MS
Dr. Mosepele is an Associate Professor of Medicine & Infectious Diseases and former Deputy Dean of Research & Graduate Studies (acting) in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Botswana. He is also the former Chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of Botswana. His research focuses on the epidemiology of HIV-associated complications (infectious and non-infectious) as well as HIV treatment and care. Dr. Mosepele has served as the National COVID-19 Task Force's deputy coordinator since March 2020 under the Leadership of The President of the Republic of Botswana. In this role, he led in the development of a national pandemic response plan. Under his leadership, Botswana attained one of the highest COVID-19 vaccination status in Africa and discovered the Omicron variant in late 2021. Dr. Mosepele has been engaged in more than 15 research grants funded by the NIH, MRC-UK and EDCTP. Most of these epidemiologic research projects focused on non-communicable disease among people living with HIV. Dr. Mosepele has authored/co-authored more than 50 peer reviewed publications. He has mentored more than 8 master of medicine candidates at University of Botswana and several other residents/clinical & research fellows from Europe and the USA.
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12:55pm – 1:35pm | Lunch
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1:40pm – 2:10pm | Keynote Address
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Soumya Swaminathan, MBBS, MD
Dr. Soumya Swaminathan is the former Chief Scientist at the World Health Organization (WHO). She previously served as WHO's Deputy Director-General for Programmes. A pediatrician from India and a globally recognized researcher on tuberculosis and HIV, she brings with her 30 years of experience in clinical care and research and has worked throughout her career to translate research into impactful programmes. Dr. Swaminathan was Secretary to the Government of India for Health Research and Director General of the Indian Council of Medical Research from 2015 to 2017. From 2009 to 2011, she also served as Coordinator of the UNICEF/UNDP/World Bank/WHO Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases in Geneva. Dr. Swaminathan is an elected Foreign Fellow of the US National Academy of Medicine and a Fellow of all three science academies in India. She has previously served on several WHO and global advisory bodies and committees, including the WHO Expert Panel to Review Global Strategy and Plan of Action on Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property, the Strategic and Technical Advisory Group of the Global TB Department at WHO, and as Co-Chair of the Lancet Commission on TB.
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2:15pm – 3:00pm | Decolonial Praxis and Health: Challenges and Priorities
Hosted in partnership with the Division of Global Health Equity at Brigham and Women’s Hospital
A loosely connected movement has recently emerged to challenge racism and ongoing coloniality in the conception and practice of global health. But criticism of this movement has also surfaced, highlighting reformist initiatives that leave power dynamics and racialized hierarchies unchallenged, the selective incorporation of decolonial principles, and the overrepresentation of institutions and voices from contexts that have accrued advantages from colonial domination and resource distribution. This panel will both explore the challenges confronting an anticolonial movement for health justice and identify decolonial and antiracism approaches with constructive potential.
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Emmanuel K. Akyeampong, PhD
Emmanuel Akyeampong is the Oppenheimer Faculty Director of the Harvard University Center for African Studies, and Ellen Gurney Professor of History and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University. He was appointed Loeb Harvard College Professor in July 2005. D. Akyeampong is a Fellow of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences (FGA), and a Corresponding Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (UK). He serves as the president of the African Public Broadcasting Foundation (US) and is a co-founder and director of the International Institute for the Advanced Study of Cultures, Institutions and Economic Enterprise (IIAS: www.interias.org.gh) based in Accra, Ghana. He served as chair of the Committee on African Studies at Harvard from July 2002 to June 2006. His research interests are social history, comparative slavery and the African diaspora, environmental history, the history of disease and medicine, economic and business history. Dr. Akyeampong was a member of the board of directors for the African Studies Association in the United States, and a former Council Member of the International African Institute. As an ordained Minister in the United Church of Christ, Professor Akyeampong also serves as a Minister for Worship and Formation at Harvard’s Memorial Church. -
Ernest J. Barthélemy, MD, MPH, MA
Dr. Ernest J. Barthélemy is the Division Chief of Neurosurgery at the SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University in Brooklyn, New York, and the founding president of the Society of Haitian Neuroscientists. A Brooklyn-born Haitian-American New Yorker, Dr. Barthélemy obtained his MD and neurosurgery residency training at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. From 2017 to 2019, he was a Paul Farmer Global Surgery Research Fellow at Harvard University, where he also completed a Master of Public Health degree with concentrations in Global Health and Public Health Leadership at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. As a scientist, his research focuses on advancing global health equity and improving outcomes in populations that are disproportionately burdened by acute neurosurgical disorders. Dr. Barthélemy also sits on the Global Health Task Force of the International League Against Epilepsy, and is the 2021-2023 Co-Chair of the Young Neurosurgeons Forum of the World Federation of Neurosurgical Societies. -
Joseph P. Gone, PhD
Joseph P. Gone is an international expert in the psychology and mental health of American Indians and other Indigenous peoples. A professor at Harvard University, Dr. Gone has collaborated with tribal communities for over 25 years to critique conventional mental health services and harness traditional culture and spirituality for advancing Indigenous well-being. He has published over 100 scientific articles and chapters, and received recognition in his fields through several fellowships and career awards, including a year-long residency at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University. A graduate of Harvard College and the University of Illinois, Dr. Gone also trained at Dartmouth College and McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School. He is currently a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, and of seven divisions of the American Psychological Association (APA). An enrolled member of the Aaniiih-Gros Ventre Tribal Nation of Montana, he also served briefly as the Chief Administrative Officer for the Fort Belknap Indian reservation. In 2014, Gone was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 2021, he received the APA Award for Distinguished Professional Contributions to Applied Research and was elected to the National Academy of Medicine. -
Lebohang Liepollo Pheko
Lebohang Liepollo Pheko is a senior research fellow and political economist at the think tank Trade Collective. She is an activist scholar, public intellectual, international movement builder and Afrikan feminist theoretician. Liepollo has lived and worked across 43 countries including South Africa, Zambia, Lesotho, Ethiopia, the United Kingdom, Senegal, Brazil and China giving political and technical solidarity to various institutions, social movements and organizations. She has published extensively inter alia on international trade, feminist political economy, decolonising higher education and regional integration. Her work has an intersectional approach. Recently, Liepollo has contributed extensively to framing policy alternatives that center African women in post-COVID-19 economic recovery and explore new definitions of work, the possibility of post-capitalism and a COVID-19 resilient, people centered ecology. She is also a Lancet Commissioner on Reparations and Redistributive Justice. -
Michelle Morse, MD, MPH
Dr. Michelle Morse is the inaugural Chief Medical Officer and Deputy Commissioner for the Center for Health Equity and Community Wellness (CHECW) at the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (NYCDOHMH) where she leads the agency’s work in bridging public health and health care to reduce health inequities, guiding CHECW’s place-based and cross-cutting health equity programs, and serving as a key liaison to clinicians and clinical leaders across New York City. Dr. Morse is an internal medicine and public health doctor who works to achieve health equity through global solidarity, social medicine and anti-racism education, and activism. She is a general internal medicine physician, part-time hospitalist at Kings County Hospital, Co-Founder of EqualHealth, and Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Morse’s continued commitment to advancing health equity and justice is informed by her experience in leadership roles as Deputy Chief Medical Officer of Partners In Heath, as a Soros Equality Fellow launching a global Campaign Against Racism and as a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy fellow with the Ways and Means Committee in the U.S. House of Representatives.
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3:05pm – 3:50pm | Community Response to Emerging Infectious Diseases
Hosted in partnership with Partners In Health
In this session panelists will discuss engaging impacted communities in responses to infectious diseases, including to COVID-19, HIV, TB, Ebola, cholera, among others. From Boston to Haiti, Sierra Leone, Peru, Lesotho, and beyond, we’ll explore the importance and challenges of engaging trusted community leaders, of utilizing emergency response efforts to build essential services for establishing resilient health systems for the long term, and of centering care resource coordination and social supports at the heart of response efforts.
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Bisola Ojikutu, MD, MPH
Bisola Ojikutu, MD, MPH, is a nationally recognized physician leader, health equity researcher, community advocate and expert in the prevention, care and treatment of infectious diseases. Dr. Ojikutu is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and a faculty member within the Division of Global Health Equity at Brigham and Women's Hospital. She was appointed Executive Director of the Boston Public Health Commission (BPHC) in September 2021. As Executive Director of the BPHC, the city's health department, Dr. Ojikutu manages a budget of $162M and leads 1,200 employees to protect, preserve, and promote the health and well-being of all Boston residents, particularly the most vulnerable. Among other public health priorities, she is committed to addressing racism as a public health crisis and advancing health equity. Dr. Ojikutu holds appointments within the Infectious Disease Division at Massachusetts General Hospitals and is an adjunct faculty member at The Fenway Institute. She has led research and developed programs focused on increasing access to health care among marginalized populations funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute and the Health Resources and Services Administration (HIV/AIDS Bureau). -
Helen Branswell
Helen Branswell is a senior writer at STAT, covering infectious diseases and global health. Branswell joined STAT at its 2015 launch. Previously, she worked for The Canadian Press, where she was the medical reporter from 2000 to 2015. Branswell was a 2004 CDC Knight Fellow, when she was embedded in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for three months. She was a 2011 Nieman Global Health Fellow at Harvard, focusing on polio eradication. She won the 2020 George Polk Award for Public Service and with colleagues was a 2020 Pulitzer finalist for breaking news for coverage of the Covid-19 pandemic. She won the 2021 Victor Cohn Prize for Excellence in Medical Science Reporting. -
Joia Mukherjee, MD, MPH
Dr. Joia Mukherjee is associate professor of medicine in the Division of Global Health Equity, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, and associate professor of global health and social medicine at Harvard Medical School. In the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, she directs the Master of Medical Sciences in Global Health Delivery program and the Program in Global Medical Education and Social Change. Dr. Mukherjee’s scholarly work focuses on the provision of health as a human right and on the design, implementation, and evaluation of comprehensive health care in resource-poor settings. Since 2000, Dr. Mukherjee has served as the chief medical officer of Partners In Health. She provides strategic guidance on the implementation of clinical programs at PIH’s sites in Haiti, Rwanda, Malawi, Lesotho, Peru, Mexico, Russia, Sierra Leone, and Liberia and has served as an expert consultant for the World Health Organization and Ministries of Health on HIV, TB, health systems strengthening and health work force development. Dr. Mukherjee also serves on the board of directors for Village Health Works (Burundi) and Muso (Mali) and the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti. -
Allan M. Brandt, PhD
Allan M. Brandt, PhD, is the Amalie Moses Kass Professor of the History of Medicine and Professor of the History of Science at Harvard University. Brandt holds a joint appointment there and at Harvard Medical School, where he is currently serving as the interim chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine. Brandt’s work focuses on twentieth-century social and ethical aspects of health, disease, medical practices, and global health. He is the author of No Magic Bullet: A Social History of Venereal Disease in the United States since 1880 (1987). His book The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall, and Deadly Persistence of the Product that Defined America received the Bancroft Prize in 2008 and the William H. Welch Medal in 2011. Brandt has been elected to the National Academy of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. From 2019 to 2020, Brandt received fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. He is currently writing about the history and ethics of stigma and its impact on patients and health outcomes. -
Jean Gregory Jerome, MD, MPH
Dr. Jean Gregory Jerome is a medical doctor, public health specialist, and Fulbright scholar with 20 years of public health experience in Haiti and consulting experience for specific WHO-sponsored projects in Rwanda and Malawi. He also has several years of experience working closely with the Ministries of Health in Liberia and Sierra Leone. With a focus in health system strengthening, Dr. Jerome has extensive background in the design, management, and implementation of health projects/programs, in quality management of medical care and services, as well as in the implementation of operational research. Dr. Jerome has worked as a clinician, program manager, technical advisor and as a senior leadership team member in both Haiti and Sierra Leone. He is currently supporting Partners in Health global as the Senior Advisor on Health System Strengthening with a focus on projects in Sierra Leone. Dr. Jerome has served as author for several publications derived from the implementation of major health projects.
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3:50pm – 4:00pm | Closing Remarks
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Louise Ivers, MB, BCh, MD, MPH, DTM&H
Professor Louise Ivers is Faculty Director of the Harvard Global Health Institute, Executive Director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Center for Global Health, and the David Bangsberg MD, MPH Endowed Chair in Global Health Equity at Mass General. She is a Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine, Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and a practicing Infectious Diseases physician at Mass General. Dr. Ivers works on the implementation and evaluation of health programs with the goal of advancing health equity and access to care and social services for impoverished communities. Dr. Ivers is the recipient of numerous honors, including the Bailey K Ashford Medal for distinguished work in tropical medicine, Leadership in the Practice of Public Health Award from the Harvard T.H. Chan School, and Distinguished Graduate of the UCD School of Medicine. She has published over one hundred articles, chapters, and perspectives on wide-ranging topics related to infectious disease, public health, and global health equity, and has contributed writing to WBUR, NPR, and the New York Times.
For questions, please email Carissa Novak at cnovak@hsph.harvard.edu. Thank you.