Athens, Ga. – Health care reform, emergency preparedness, traffic safety and obesity are just a few of the common global health issues to be tackled by researchers, health care providers and policymakers from the U.S. and Israel at the fourth annual Global Health Symposium to be held Sept. 7 – 8 at the University of Georgia.
The conference, titled “Globalization of Health Care: Common Problems – Seeking Common Solutions,” will be hosted by the UGA College of Public Health Center for Global Health, with support from the Biomedical and Health Sciences Institute, and will showcase the center’s ongoing partnership in research and education with the University of Haifa in Israel. Students, faculty, staff and members of the community are invited to attend the symposium. The fee is $5 for both days, and online registration will end Sept. 6.
“Israel is a fascinating, developed country with a successful healthcare system that can be a model to seek best practices,” said Dr. Richard Schuster, professor of health policy and management and director of the Center for Global Health. “With universal health care coverage, Israel has substantially lower infant mortality rates, lower cardiovascular death rates and dramatically lower health care costs than does the U.S.”
The symposium will get underway at the Paul D. Coverdell Center for Biomedical and Health Sciences, with a welcome from College of Public Health administrators as well as representatives from the Office of Consulate General of Israel in the Southeast. Keynote speaker Kavita Pandit, UGA’s associate provost for international education, will discuss the internationalization of education at UGA and set the stage for topics to be address through the remainder of the symposium.
The symposium will continue the next day at the UGA Tate Student Center Reception Hall, where faculty from UGA and the University of Haifa will discuss a global health topic from each country’s perspective.
Relationships between Israeli organizations and the College of Public Health are helping the Center for Global Health carry out its mission of identifying best practices of health care, as well as supporting their dissemination, adaptation and adoption throughout the world in order to improve health care for all, explained Schuster.
“We, as nations, share similar health problems, and working together to seek common solutions is valuable,” Schuster said. “The center is hopeful that continuing student and faculty exchanges, joint teaching, and research between the two universities will foster further collaborations between the two nations.”
UGA and the University of Haifa recently signed a cooperative agreement. In addition to this joint conference, a UGA graduate study abroad opportunity in global health will be offered jointly at the University of Haifa in the summer of 2012. This new partnership also is exploring mutual research interests.
The symposium is supported through gifts from UGA alumni Dr. Harold S. Solomon and Milly Pincus Solomon, as well as from the Israeli Consulate General of the Southeast in Atlanta. Additional partners include the University of Haifa, Athens Chapter of Hadassah, American-Israel Chamber of Commerce-Southeast Region, the UGA Office of International Education and Hillel at UGA.
For more information or to register, see http://globalhealth.uga.edu/2011/.
About the UGA Center for Global Health
The UGA Global Health Symposium is a joint effort of the College of Public Health Center for Global Health and the Biomedical and Health Sciences Institute aimed at building momentum behind new programs in global health at UGA while addressing how culture and society, infectious disease, nutrition and the environment impact public health issues around the world.
Formed in 2009, the UGA Center for Global Health leads efforts in the College of Public Health to study, teach and serve in the areas of global health. Its mission is to find the best practices in health care delivery wherever they are in the world and adapt them to improve public health practices not only in Georgia and the U.S., but also in the underserved and developing nations that need them the most.
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