UNIVERSITY COALITIONS for GLOBAL HEALTH

Hi Folks-sorry for the lapse in blogs, life has been very busy with UCGH at the moment. Good news is our friend, Rachel Swanson from UNICEF offered to update us all on the situation in Myanmar. Thanks Rachel! (read below or check out Rachel’s blog)

The situation for children continues to worsen in Myanmar as thousands of children have been separated from their families, many more are living in desperate conditions in relief camps, and some are drinking water from ponds covered with dead bodies.

Below, a man collects wood near the carcass of a cow killed by the cyclone, some 50 kilometres south-west of the township of Kunyangon. As bodies decompose, the water supply is further contaminated.

Here, a woman breastfeeds her infant in the temporary shelter of a monastery near the village of Pyanpon in the southern Irrawaddy Division. Behind them, another woman and child share the same bed. They have all been displaced by the cyclone.

UNICEF has distributed pre-positioned supplies to hard-hit areas. Below, a man secures a UNICEF aid package to the back of his bicycle, with the help of his two sons, in the cyclone-affected township of Kunyangon in the southern Yangon Division.

More to follow.

In the meantime, if you want to help, please consider making a donation or posting a badge on your website or blog.

Thank you for your support.

Tags:
cyclone
Myanmar
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Posted by Alisa Aydin, UNICEF USA on May 12, 2008 7:44 AM
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Please help out our friends at Universities Allied for Essential Medicines (UAEM)
and take action for access to medicines today! ~Stephanie

Hello Global Health Partners,

As many of you may know, next week will be the final round of negotiations at the World Health Organization Intergovernmental Working Group on Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property. These negotiations are critical as they are the one place where health advocates and developing countries are really being heard in a part of the access to medicines debate that has normally taken place at the WTO and produced such disastrous agreements as TRIPS.

Unfortunately, the Association of University Technology Mangers (AUTM), the group of university officials who manage university patents, are taking the line of the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) and PhRMA. AUTM has asked its members to sign onto a letter authored by an anti-access think tank, the Institute for Policy Innovation (you can read more about the disastrous policies they support at their web site http://www.ipi.org/).

It is reprehensible that AUTM would take such a position in asking its members to sign on. Furthermore, AUTM had a representative at the last round of negotiations on the BIO delegation and will likely do so again. BIO and PhRMA/IFPMA have worked feverishly to undermine the negotiations.

If you can, we’d appreciate if you and your members could join UAEM in a call in to the office of AUTM’s president, Jon Soderstrom of Yale University.

Call AUTM’s President to tell him AUTM’s Actions are Unacceptable

On Thursday, call John Soderstrom, the current president of AUTM, at his office at Yale to let him know that the steps AUTM has taken in endorsing this letter are unacceptable.

His office at Yale is the Office of Cooperative Research. When the receptionist answers, ask to speak to him. If they don’t pass you to him, ask to speak to someone or leave a message from the script below.

Office of Cooperative Research Phone Number: (203) 436-8096
Fax a letter signed by you based on the script to: (203) 436-8086

Call Script

“(Enter here: my name is and/or I am a student/researcher/citizen) I’m calling to voice my concern over the recent actions taken by the Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM). I understand that AUTM is urging university technology transfer officers to sign a lobbying letter against measures aimed at expanding access to medicines in developing countries.

[This letter is to be published in major newspapers and it is aimed against the World Heath Organization’s Intergovernmental Working Group (IGWG) on Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property.]

This letter is against proposals that would help hundreds of millions of patients all over the world.

As the voice of technology transfer officers at educational institutions, who claim to operate for the public good, we call on John Soderstrom as president of AUTM to:

-Retract AUTM’s support of this letter, which is harmful and counterproductive to solving the access to medicines problem, one of the major global issues of our time.
-Take real action to improve access to medicines coming out of universities. AUTM should adopt concrete, effective, transparent policies to ensure access to university research in the developing world.

Thank you.”

Please let me know what you think and thank you,

Ethan Guillen
Executive Director
Universities Allied for Essential Medicines

Schedule of Student Events and the Global Health Council 2008 Conference:

Tuesday, May 27:
• 9:30-11 am: Panel Session: Careers in Global Health: How We Got Started

Learn more about careers in global health from senior-level professionals. Prominent global health figures will describe the unique characteristics of their field and how and why they got started in global health. See the GHC website for details on the speakers.

• 2:30-5 pm: Global Health Career Fair

This event provides a convenient location for students and job seekers to connect with recruiters from non-profit organizations, government agencies, corporations and academic institutions to discuss organizational functions, desired skill sets, current and future employment and internship opportunities, career paths in the field, and other career information. Each recruiter will have entry-level positions available.
o Author Patricia Ohmans will be available and selling copies of her and Garth Osborn’s hit book, Finding Work in Global Health, a practical guide for job-seekers or anyone who wants to make the world a healthier place.

• 7:30-9 pm: Student and Young Professional Networking Reception, hosted by GlobeMed and UCGH

Connect with your peers at the Student and Young Professional Networking Reception, hosted by GlobeMed and the University Coalitions for Global Health, and get involved with some of the leading global health student organizations. Representatives from the Student Global AIDS Campaign, Americans for Informed Democracy, The American Medical Student Association and many more will be present.

Wednesday, May 28:
• 12:15-1:15 pm: Brown-Bag Session: Getting a Job in Global Health

This event will focus on gaining international experience, possible career paths, the value of professional development and mentoring, and networking at the conference. There will also be real-life examples of GHFP Fellows currently working in global health and a question-and-answer session with senior program staff.

The Global Health Fellows Program presently has 75 fellows in a broad range of positions working with USAID and partner organizations in developing countries and Washington, D.C. Focus areas include HIV/AIDS, malaria, TB, avian influenza, maternal and child health, family planning and reproductive health.

Thursday, May 29:
• 12:30-2 pm: Brown-Bag Session, Film Series at Career Connections: Mountains of Hope: Film and Global Health

Join us for a special screening of the student-produced documentary Mountains of Hope, and learn about careers in film and global health from an independent documentary filmmaker whose background is in international development work.

Friday, May 30:
• 12:45-1:45: Brown-Bag Session: Finding Work in Global Health

Considering a global health career, a part-time internship, or simply a volunteer stint overseas? You won’t want to miss this brown-bag workshop. Patricia Ohmans, MPH, co-author of the book Finding Work in Global Health, will offer an insider’s guide to entering the field. Her lively, interactive presentation will cover the 10 top myths about global health; seven ways to work in the field; a dozen questions to ask yourself BEFORE you go, and more. This session is designed especially for entry-level professionals, but NGO recruiters are cordially invited to participate.

• 2:15-4:15: Advocacy Training Workshop: Youth Strategies for Creating Change
o

Want to make a difference on your campus? Come learn from grassroots activists about empowering youth in support of global health advocacy issues. Topics covered include coalition building, designing campaign strategies, mobilizing youth-based communities, and effective campus organizing.

Hey All—Check out a word from our partners at SPW! If you’re looking to volunteer abroad then they’re your people!

Students Partnership Worldwide (SPW) was a founding member of UCGH, and currently works as part of the professional development working group. SPW was established in London in 1985, and has developed a respected international reputation for its youth-led health and environmental education programs, with endorsements from the World Bank, UNESCO, WHO and UNAIDS.

SPW harnesses the energy and enthusiasm of trained volunteers (aged 18-28) to run targeted, peer-led education programs to empower young people in rural communities in Africa and Asia. Nearly 1000 volunteers a year participate in SPW programs: over 85% of the participants are African or Asian, while the other 15% are recruited from North America, Europe and Australia. This diversity brings an enormous range of skills and experience to each program, as well as an enjoyable opportunity for meaningful cultural exchange.

Following 3-6 weeks of intensive training, international volunteers are placed in pairs or small groups with national and local volunteers within rural communities in Uganda, Tanzania, South Africa, Zambia, India or Nepal. These teams live and work together full time for 5-12 months. SPW volunteers use a range of formal and informal methods (school lessons, extracurricular activities, community seminars, youth resource centers, and community-wide festivals) to teach about issues such as sanitation, nutrition, organic farming techniques, HIV/AIDS, and child rights. To promote sustainability, the focus of each project is decided on through collaboration between the volunteers and local community members and leaders.

Want to learn more? Join our next FREE Information Session conference call! The information session will last about an hour and will give you a chance to hear more about our programs, our application process, and why SPW is unique among international volunteer opportunities. Just shoot an email to info@spw-usa.org to register for the free call. For more information, please see our website www.spw-usa.org

Hi All—Again I have some bad news, our PEPFAR update will have to wait. Mark up in the House has been postponed due to the death of the great Representative Tom Lantos. The new hopeful date will be sometime around Feb 25th. Until then, here’s some information about one of our members, Americans for Informed Democracy. Check them out. they’re pretty cool!
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Americans for Informed Democracy (AID) is a non-partisan 501(c)(3) organization that brings the world home through programming on more than 1,000 U.S. university campuses and in more than 10 countries. AID fulfills its mission by coordinating town hall meetings on America’s role in the world, hosting leadership retreats, and publishing opinion pieces and reports on issues of global importance.

AID is one of the fastest growing student networks in the world, filling a niche that combines an interest in foreign policy with youth activism. In just four years, the organization has grown to more than 1,000 universities in over 25 countries, attracting diverse student audiences, as well as prominent NGO partners and local, national and international media attention.

When AID began four years ago, most youth-led groups were devoted to specific global causes, but there was no organization connecting young people across various issues dedicated to establishing a principled and collaborative international role for the U.S.
Filling this void, AID brings together more than 15,000 young people who connect with the public and participate in various global campaigns. And AID gets beyond the usual partisan divisions by focusing on global issues that are somewhat less politicized and divisive — like global poverty, health, the environment, and cross-cultural understanding.

AID is also using new technologies to bring the world together. In one year, AID student leaders conducted videoconferences with peers in more than 60 countries to discuss how the U.S. can work collaboratively with other countries to solve global challenges.

Hey All–This week is a busy one in Washington, because the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) is up for Reauthorization this year and is going to “mark up” in the House tomorrow. I’ll have more updates on that later in the week, but first I’ll pass over the blogging baton to Victor from GlobeMed to talk more about what it is that his organization does and how you can get involved! Cheers!
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GlobeMed connects the resources of our thirteen student-led chapters at universities across the U.S. directly to grassroots health organizations to work in partnership to design and support innovative and vital health projects. For example, GlobeMed members at Northwestern worked with local partners near Ho, Ghana to construct a health clinic in Ho, Ghana that now provides health services to a rural population. Students at University of Michigan designed and implemented a health education program for a free clinic in an underserved area of Detroit. While a common vision and mission unite members at each of our campuses, the strength of the GlobeMed network rests in each chapter’s unique projects and efforts.

Our aim is not only to improve health in communities around the world, but to educate and train the next generation of leaders for global health. We stimulate critical thinking on global health issues and provide a framework in which students can gain personal and professional skills for affecting change. Through year-round programs on campus and across the country, we help catalyze students to commit their lives to social justice and global health. By tying education to action, GlobeMed is playing a vital role in advancing a student-driven global health movement.

-Victor