FEBRUARY 7, 2012
More than 400 attend second annual UC Global Health Day
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| Martha Campbell (left) and Claire Norris (right) of the Bixby Center, with visiting scholar Dr. Juan Garay. Campbell chaired the second plenary session at the UC Global Health Day. |
The second annual UC Global Health Day, hosted at Berkeley on Saturday, February 4, was a sold-out event attended by more than 250 students, as well as UC faculty, staff, and international participants. This year’s event focused on population growth and its impact on health worldwide, and was a showcase for global health research being undertaken by graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and junior faculty across the UC campuses.
Two special sessions in the morning featured prominent speakers from the United States and abroad. UC Berkeley School of Public Health Professor Malcolm Potts, director and founder of the Bixby Center for Population, Health & Sustainability chaired the first session on population, consumption, and human wellbeing. Martha Campbell, lecturer in global health at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health, chaired the second morning session, Consequences of High Fertility and Population Growth: The Special Case of Africa.
"The future of many African nations hinges on the policies that African governments develop and the investment the international community is prepared to make around voluntary family planning," said Campbell.
Sir John E. Sulston, the 2002 Nobel laureate in medicine, was the first keynote speaker. He chairs the People and the Planet Working Group of the Royal Society, London. Eliya Msiyaphazi Zulu, executive director of the African Institute for Development Policy, Nairobi, and president of the Union for African Population Studies, Kenya, was the second keynote speaker.
Both morning plenary sessions also featured prominent scientists from several UC campuses, including Dr. Ndola Prata, associate professor in residence, and scientific director of the Bixby Center. The afternoon break-out sessions covered a broad range of global health topics presented by faculty and students from across the UC system.
"Students and young faculty are the main drivers behind the incredible growth in global health research and education programs on UC campuses," said Dr. Haile Debas, director of the UC Global Health Institute and former chancellor and dean of the School of Medicine at UCSF. "UC Global Health Day provides a forum to share their research and ignite collaborations that could lead to innovations in addressing major health problems in developing countries."
The conference was sponsored by the UC Global Health Institute, in partnership with the UC Berkeley Center for Global Public Health, UC Berkeley Bixby Center for Population, Health & Sustainability, and the Northern California International Health Interest Group.
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