For many students, Spring Break offers a well-earned chance to relax between terms, but for a group of HSPH students, the week provided an opportunity to travel to Japan to observe firsthand public health in that country. Organized by master's student Kohei Onozaki, president of the HSPH Student Club of Japan, and eight Japanese trip committee members, the group traveled from March 18 to 26 to Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, Hiroshima, and Kyoto. They met the Japanese Minister and Vice Minister of Health, visited St. Luke's Hospital to learn about its response to the 1995 sarin gas attacks in the Tokyo subway system, went to the Japan Medical Association to review its role in national health policy decisionmaking, toured a Toyota automobile factory to learn about occupational health, and visited elementary schools to assess their school lunch programs. Their trip attracted the attention of six Japanese newspapers and NHK, the country's national broadcast network. The students also attended three information sessions organized by their hosts for prospective students who may be interested in attending the School. The HSPH students are writing a report and led a special Global Chat about their trip for faculty advisors and for the School at large. For more information, visit the Japan Trip homepage.
Students visited one of Japan's famous fish markets to gain a sense of the country's culture as well as insight into various workplaces.
The students, primarily from HSPH, gathered in Kyoto with one of their guides.
A trip to a school provided a way to compare Japanese school lunches, which are planned by nutritionists, to American lunch programs.
Copyright, 2009, President and Fellows of Harvard College
