Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies

The Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies hosted a conference entitled "Social Determinants of Global Population Health," co-sponsored by the Harvard Center on the Developing Child, the Harvard Initiative for Global Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Commission to Build a Healthier America. Gvernment officials and academic and foundation leaders from Brazil, China, India, Japan, Mexico, Uganda, United Kingdom, and the U.S. convened to develop tangible next steps to reducing health inequalities around the globe and to translate public health and social science research into effective practice and policy. It represented a unique and timely opportunity to build on the recommendations in the 2008 WHO Commission on Social Determinants of Health Final Report and the 2009 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Commission to Build a Healthier America Report. Key speakers included:

• Lisa Berkman, Director, Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies and the Thomas D. Cabot Professor of Public Policy and of Epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health. She is an internationally-recognized social epidemiologist whose work focuses extensively on social and policy influences on health outcomes. Presentation available here. 
• Julio Frenk, Dean of the Faculty and T & G Angelopoulos Professor of Public Health and International Development at the Harvard School of Public Health. Dr. Frenk is an eminent authority on global health who served as the Minister of Health of Mexico from 2000 to 2006. He pursued an ambitious agenda to reform the nation’s health system, with an emphasis on redressing social inequality.
• Sir Michael Marmot, Director of the International Institute for Society and Health, and MRC Research Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health, University College, London. Dr. Marmot was Chair of the WHO Commission on Social Determinants of Health from 2005 to 2008. Hehas led a research group on health inequalities for the past 30 years. He is Principal Investigator of the Whitehall Studies of British civil servants, investigating explanations for the striking inverse social gradient in morbidity and mortality. He leads the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) and is engaged in several international research efforts on the social determinants of health. He chairs the Department of Health Scientific Reference Group on tackling health inequalities. He was a member of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution for six years and is an honorary fellow of the British Academy.

This event was made possible by generous gifts from Seth and Sarah Glickenhaus; Ambika Collins and Phyllis Collins; The Dillon Fund; and The Clarence and Anne Dillon Dunwalke Trust

Frameworks, questions, & studies: a Latin American/North American exploratory workshop on investigating societal determinants of health inequities between & within countries - October 22 & 23, 2009)

The goal of this workshop was to: bring together a small group of public health professionals from throughout theAmericas who are interested in exploring: (a) different frameworks for analyzing cross- and within- country/region health inequities, (b) the kinds of theoretical and empirical questions that consequently would be useful to ask, and (c) what data are or are not available to answer these questions; build awareness of potentials for cross-country/region collaborations, in relation to both possible investigators and possible data resources; and help set the basis for a 2010 joint regional meeting of the International Epidemiologic Association (IEA), to be held in Latin America, that will be co-organized by two of the workshop attendants: Maria Inês Schmidt (for the Latin American IEA region) and Nancy Krieger (for the North American IEA region).

Social Capital and Health - Cross-Country Comparative Perspectives - June 19 & 20, 2009

This international symposium sought to bring together researchers conducting research on social capital and health in Japan, USA, the UK, India, and Latin America to share cross-national and inter-disciplinary perspectives. The 2-day symposium focused on strengthening causal inference in empirical research linking social capital to health outcomes, and highlighting emerging directions for research, with an outcome of launching cross-country collaborations and discussing a possible book-length project.

Grand Reopening - October 7, 2008