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UGA forum to focus on human health in global societies March 31

Athens, Ga. – University of Georgia faculty from across multiple disciplines will discuss emerging health welfare issues influencing human populations of all ages during the 2011 Global Educational Forum on Human Health in Global Societies March 31 at the Tate Student Center.

“Unsettled global economies and dramatic changes in climate, along with advances in technology, have spiked transnational and rural-urban movement of human populations, producing serious threats to health welfare, such as the spread of infectious diseases and the increase of non-communicable diseases.” said Rose Chepyator-Thomson, a professor in kinesiology, who is the founder and program director of the Global Educational Forum. “That’s why we believe this forum is timely and critically important.”

UGA scholars, primarily from the School of Law, College of Education, College of Public Health, and College of Family and Consumer Sciences, will discuss outcomes of their research and offer considerations for future direction in research, curriculum and public policy.

The forum also provides students with an opportunity to communicate their dissertation studies, theses or independent studies that focus on global research, as well as study abroad service and outreach activities.

Faculty presentations will be held from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. in Tate’s Grand Hall A, B and C. Fazal Khan, assistant professor in the School of Law, will deliver the opening keynote address on The Human Factor: Globalizing Ethical Standards in Drug Trials through Market Exclusion at 8 a.m., and Michael Schmidt, an assistant professor in the College of Education’s department of kinesiology, will give the closing keynote address on Childhood Obesity in Westernized Countries: Causes, Consequences, and the Role of Physical Activity at 3:30 p.m. Student poster award presentations will be held at 4:30 p.m.

The 2011 UGA Global Educational Forum will include these scholars and topics:

Three presentations will be made on Perspectives on Nutrition and Health in Africa, 9:30-10:30 a.m., featuring:

  • Alex Kojo Anderson, assistant professor, food and nutrition, Maternal and Child Nutrition in West Africa: The Case of Ghana
  • Julie Moore, professor, infectious diseases, Women Living Under Intense Malaria Transmission Conditions in Kenya: Understanding Their Immunity to Malaria at the Placental Level
  • James Oloya, assistant professor, epidemiology and biostatistics,Zoonotic Mycobacteria at the Human-Environment-Livestock Interphase (HELI) in the Pastoral Areas of Uganda

Two presentations will be made on Health, Food and Culture in Latin America,

11 a.m.-12:15 p.m., featuring:

  • Luke Naeher, associate professor, environmental health science, Exposure Assessment and Human Health Related to Indoor Air Pollution in Peru, South America
  • Silvia Giraudo, an associate professor, food and nutrition, Nutrition in the Spanish Population: Foods and Culture

Two presentations will be made on Health in Asia and Southeastern Europe, 2-3:15 p.m., featuring:

  • Kandauda Wickrama, professor, child and family development; Post-Tsunami mental health of mothers and their adolescent children in Sri Lanka
  • Carol Cotton, instructor, health promotion and behavior, Health and Croatia: A Country in Transition

This year’s forum sponsors include the UGA African Studies Institute, the Latin American and Caribbean Studies Institute, the College of Education, the College of Public Health, the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, the department of kinesiology, the Institute for African American Studies, the Institute for Women’s Studies, the Office of Institutional Diversity and the Office of International Education.

For more information, see www.coe.uga.edu/cuspa/conference/.