Public Health
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Mary Assunta, Research Fellow will speak on Tobacco Control--TTCs in Asia, with her experience as part of the Tobacco Documentation Project, School of Public Health, and Faculty of Medicine at The University of Sydney, Australia.

Anthropology
Building 50, Room 51A
(Inner Quad, next to the Memorial Church)

Mary Assunta Resarch Fellow Speaker Tobacco Documentation Project, School of Public Health, Faculty Medicine, University of Sydney, Australia
Lectures
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Margaretha Haglund will be speaking, with the following Commissions present:

  • Head if the National Tobacco Control Program in Sweden (1992-2007); WHO Euro-National Counterpart of Tobacco;
  • Member of the Swedish delegation of the WHO-Framework Convention on Tobacco Control negotiations;
  • One of the two Members from Sweden for the European Network for Smoking Prevention (ENSP);
  • Member of ILGTH – An International Tobacco Control Network

Anthropology, Building 50, Room 51A
450 Serra Mall
(Inner Quad, next to Memorial Church)

Margaretha Haglund Senior Advisor and International Consultant Speaker Tobacco Control Expert National Institute of Health, Sweden; Tobacco Control working for the WHO and IUHTL
Lectures
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Climate change is projected to have adverse impacts on public health. Cobenefits may be possible from more upstream mitigation of greenhouse gases causing climate change. To help measure such cobenefits alongside averted disease-specific risks, a health impact assessment (HIA) framework can more comprehensively serve as a decision support tool. HIA also considers health equity, clearly part of the climate change problem. New choices for energy must be made carefully considering such effects as additional pressure on the world's forests through large-scale expansion of soybean and oil palm plantations, leading to forest clearing, biodiversity loss and disease emergence, expulsion of subsistence farmers, and potential increases in food prices and emissions of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Investigators must consider the full range of policy options, supported by more comprehensive, flexible, and transparent assessment methods.

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Annual Reviews of Public Health
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Holly Gibbs
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As we find ourselves at the start of the "biological century" with a wealth of potential benefits to public health, agriculture, and global economies, it is almost deliberately naive to think that the extraordinary growth in the life sciences might not be exploited for nefarious purposes. A report published in 2006 by an ad hoc committee of the National Academies of Science recognized that the breadth of biological threats is much broader than commonly appreciated and will continue to expand for the foreseeable future. The nature of these threats, and a set of potential approaches with which to mitigate these threats, will be reviewed.

David Relman, MD, is professor of medicine, and of microbiology and immunology at Stanford University. He is also chief, infectious diseases section, at the VA Palo Alto Health Care System in Palo Alto, California. His research is directed towards the characterization of the human indigenous microbial communities, with emphasis on understanding variation in diversity, succession, the effects of disturbance, and the role of these communities in health and disease.  This work brings together approaches from ecology, population biology, environmental microbiology, genomics and clinical medicine.  In addition, his research explores the classification structure of humans and non-human primates with systemic infectious diseases, based on patterns of genome-wide gene transcript abundance in blood and other tissues. The goals of this work are to recognize classes of pathogen and predict clinical outcome at early time points in the disease process, as well as to gain further insights into virulence. Past scientific achievements include the description of a novel approach for identifying previously-unknown pathogens, the identification of a number of new human microbial pathogens, including the agent of Whipple's disease, and some of the most extensive analyses to date of the human indigenous microbial ecosystem. See http://relman.stanford.edu

Among his other activities, Dr. Relman currently serves as Chair of the Board of Scientific Counselors of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIH), Chair of the Institute of Medicine's Forum on Microbial Threats (U.S. National Academies of Science), member of the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, and advises several U.S. Government departments and agencies on matters related to pathogen diversity, the future life sciences landscape, and the nature of present and future biological threats.  He co-chaired a three-year study at the National Academy of Sciences that produced a report entitled, "Globalization, Biosecurity, and the Future of the Life Sciences" (2006). He is a member of the American Academy of Microbiology. Dr. Relman received the Squibb Award of the IDSA in 2001, and was the recipient of both the NIH Director's Pioneer Award, and the Distinguished Clinical Scientist Award from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, in 2006.

Reuben W. Hills Conference Room

David Relman Professor of Medicine and of Microbiology and Immunology Speaker Stanford University
Seminars
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Teh-wei Hu is a Professor Emeritus of health economics at the University of California, Berkeley.  At Berkeley, he served as associate dean (1999-2002) and department chair (1990-1993) in the School of Public Health.  He received his PhD in Economics from the University of Wisconsin.  

During the past 40 years, Professor Hu has been teaching and conducting research in health economics, particularly in healthcare financing and the economics of tobacco control.  Hu was a Fulbright scholar in China. He has served as consultant or advisor to the World Bank, the World Health Organization, the National Institutes of Health, the Institute of Medicine, the Rand Corporation, the Ministry of Health in the People's Republic of China, Department of Health and Welfare in Hong Kong, Department of Health in the Republic of China (Taiwan), and many private research institutions and foundations. 

Professor Hu will speak to us immediately after an April trip to China, sharing his research and perspectives on the economics of tobacco control and the debate about healthcare system reforms in China (including a possible link between the two through financing expansions in coverage through increased tobacco taxation).

Philippines Conference Room

Teh-wei Hu Professor Emeritus Speaker University of California, Berkeley, School of Public Health
Seminars
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Context: Studies of prostitution have focused largely on individuals involved in the commercial sex trade, with an emphasis on understanding the public health effect of this behavior. However, a broader understanding of how prostitution affects mental and physical health is needed. In particular, the study of prostitution among individuals in substance use treatment would improve efforts to provide comprehensive treatment. Objectives: To document the prevalence of prostitution among women and men entering substance use treatment, and to test the association between prostitution, physical and mental health, and health care utilization while adjusting for reported history of childhood sexual abuse, a known correlate of prostitution and poor health outcomes.

Design, Setting, and Participants: Cross-sectional, secondary data analysis of 1606 women and 3001 men entering substance use treatment in the United States who completed a semistructured intake interview as part of a larger study. Main Outcome

Measures: Self-reported physical health (respiratory, circulatory, neurological, and internal organ conditions, bloodborne infections) and mental health (depression, anxiety, psychotic symptoms, and suicidal behavior), and use of emergency department, clinic, hospital, or inpatient mental health services within the past year.

Results: Many participants reported prostitution in their lifetime (50.8% of women and 18.5% of men) and in the past year (41.4% of women and 11.2% of men). Prostitution was associated with increased risk for bloodborne viral infections, sexually transmitted diseases, and mental health symptoms. Prostitution was associated with use of emergency care in women and use of inpatient mental health services for men.

Conclusions: Prostitution was common among a sample of individuals entering substance use treatment in the United States and was associated with higher risk of physical and mental health problems. Increased efforts toward understanding prostitution among patients in substance use treatment are warranted. Screening for prostitution in substance use treatment could allow for more comprehensive care to this population.

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Archives of General Psychiatry
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Rapid population aging in many Asian countries poses an increased burden of care for elderly people with disabilities. Traditionally, care for the disabled elderly was provided by family members co-residing or living nearby. However, declining fertility rates, eroding social norms, and growing rates of labor force participation among females have changed the overall picture of informal care. 

One important policy question is whether informal caregiving affects caregivers' labor force participation. This question is particularly relevant for rapidly developing economies including newly industrialized countries, because a shrinking working-age population is another major concern with population aging. Providing different answers to this question leads to different policy implications for long-term care policy and labor market policy. 

Most of the existing literature on this issue comes from the United States and Europe. Using data from the first wave of the "Korean Longitudinal Study of Aging", Do's research not only provides results from a less-studied Asian society, but also takes into account different patterns of living arrangements and labor force participation. His talk will deal with the methodological issue of endogeneity between informal caregiving and labor force participation, and explore gender and age group differences.

Young Kyung Do is currently completing his PhD in health policy and administration at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Public Health. He has also earned both an MD and a master of public health degrees from Seoul National University (in 1997 and 2003, respectively). Young earned board certification in preventive medicine from the Korean Medical Association in 2004.

Daniel and Nancy Okimoto Conference Room

Young K. Do Speaker
Seminars
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In early 2007, CSIS launched an expert task force to examine the growing involvement of the Department of Defense as a direct provider of “non-traditional” security assistance, concentrated in counterterrorism, capacity building, stabilization and reconstruction, and humanitarian relief. The task force set out to shed light on what drives this trend, including the new global threat environment; assess what was happening at the same time in the diplomatic and developmental realms; evaluate DOD performance in conducting its expanded missions; and consider the impact of the Pentagon’s enlarged role on broader U.S. national security, foreign policy and development interests. From the outset, the task force sought to generate concrete, practical recommendations to Congress and the White House on reforms and legislation that will create a better and more sustainable balance between military and civilian tools.

J. Stephen Morrison joined CSIS in early 2000. He directs the CSIS Africa Program, the CSIS Task Force on HIV/AIDS (begun in 2001) and most recently co-directed a CSIS Task Force on non-traditional U.S. security assistance. In his role as director of the Africa Program, he has conducted studies on the United States’ rising energy stakes in Africa, counter-terrorism, the stand-up of the U.S. Africa Command, and implications for U.S. foreign policy. In 2005–2006, he was co-director of the Council on Foreign Relations Independent Task Force on Africa, ‘Beyond Humanitarianism: A Strategic U.S. Approach Toward Africa.’ Immediately prior to that, he was executive secretary of the Africa Policy Advisory Panel, commissioned by the U.S. Congress and overseen by then–Secretary of State Colin Powell. From 2005 up to the present, he has directed multi-phase work on China’s expansive engagement in Africa. His work on HIV/AIDS and related global health issues has involved multiple missions to China, Russia, India, Vietnam and Africa, and most recently, a series of focused studies on the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. He publishes widely, testifies often before Congress, and is a frequent commentator in major media on U.S. foreign policy, Africa, foreign assistance, and global public health. From 1996 through early 2000, Morrison served on the secretary of state’s policy planning staff, where he was responsible for African affairs and global foreign assistance issues. From 1993 to 1995, he conceptualized and launched USAID’s Office of Transition Initiatives, which operates in countries emerging from protracted internal conflict and misrule. From 1992 until mid-1993, he was the U.S. democracy and governance adviser in Ethiopia and Eritrea. In the period 1987 to 1991, he was senior staff member of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa. Morrison holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Wisconsin, has been an adjunct professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies since 1994, and is a graduate magna cum laude of Yale College. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

CISAC Conference Room

J. Stephen Morrison Executive Director Speaker HIV/AIDS Task Force and Director, Africa Program, Center for Strategic & International Studies
Seminars

Funded in 2009, the Program on Human Rights (PHR) is a unique intersection of the social sciences and public-policy formation and implementation. It provides a forum for the dozens of Stanford faculty who work in disciplines that engage or border on human rights (including law, philosophy, political science, education, human biology, public health, history and religious studies) and the more than 30 student-initiated human rights groups on campus. It seeks to relate the research and findings of the academic disciplines to domestic and human rights policy today.

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