Go Thailand
Knowledge and Skills for Addressing Emerging Infectious Disease at the Convergence of Animal, Human and Environmental Health
Jan. 30-Feb. 9, 2012
Chiang Mai University
Chiang Mai, Thailand
To be held at: the Imperial Mae Ping Hotel
4.5 credit class in spring term
About the Program
The world is interconnected politically, financially, biologically and socially. It is also connected through trade, travel and commerce. All of these factors power the convergence of animal, human and environmental health. One Health is about working collaboratively across disciplines and professions because it is no longer possible to focus on any single domain of health without impacting and including others.
This intensive study abroad opportunity will focus on One Health Leadership during week one, and will have tracks from which students can select including cross-species surveillance, comparative public health systems and policies, analytic epidemiology and field pathology all within the framework of One Health during week two.
The course is held in collaboration with Chiang Mai University, in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Faculty members from Chiang Mai University along with Debra Olson, Linda Olson Keller and Will Hueston will lead the expert faculty team for this offering, which also includes University of Minnesota faculty from the Schools of Public Health, Nursing and Medicine and the College of Veterinary Medicine, and the USAID RESPOND Project with Tufts and DAI Washington.
Students from Chiang Mai University and from other Southeast Asian universities will participate in the class, in addition to University of Minnesota graduate students.
Program details
Week 1 focuses on One Health Leadership. The objectives of the One Health Leadership course are:
- Deepen understanding of the ‘grand challenges’, those complex, multi-factorial, systemic issues emerging at the convergence of public health, animal health, economic development and environmental health;
- Develop key leadership skills for catalyzing collective action including communications, working across boundaries, influence, vision and strategic thinking, and accomplishing results and catalyzing change;
- Use leadership competencies in working with a diverse group of people to address complex challenges and opportunities, such as global food security, emerging infectious diseases, or the control of catastrophic animal diseases;
- Define One Health and One Health Leadership and identify the key elements of these concepts; Identify critical skills and knowledge needed to improve health at the interface of human, animal and environmental health;
- Describe examples of the convergence of human, animal and environmental health through case studies with a focus on emerging zoonotic diseases and disease outbreak response and control in humans, livestock and wildlife;
- Define health from multicultural perspectives.
During week 2 students will have the opportunity to attend 1 of 4 tracks. The objectives of the four tracks are:
Cross-species Surveillance:
- Describe the role of surveillance and monitoring system used in public health.
- Develop understanding of important key concepts for cross species transmission.
- Develop understanding of policy and regulation for disease surveillance.
- Develop understanding of attributes of health surveillance systems, and their use in evaluating health surveillance systems.
Analytic Epidemiology: - Understand the origins and key concepts of analytic epidemiology including epidemiological studies and their benefits and pitfalls
- Identify different applications of analytic epidemiology in public health
- Use basic statistics to help make conclusions from the epidemiological studies
Comparative Global Public Health Systems and Policies:
- Describe ways public health systems are constructed, funded, implemented and evaluated to meet the needs of individuals, families and communities in high resource and low resource countries.
Field Pathology:
- Identify issues related to conducting field pathology and its relationship to human, wildlife, domestic livestock, and environmental health.
- Deepen understanding of the emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases, gross and microscopic pathology and its relationship to public health, animal health, economic development and environmental health.
- Identify critical skills and knowledge needed to collect, storage and submit the appropriate samples from the field, and diagnostic methods required for the disease diagnosis.
- Describe examples of the early disease diagnosis through case studies with a focus on emerging and re-emerging infectious or zoonotic diseases in humans, livestock and wildlife.
- Understanding and identify the lesions through the carcass examination from the slaughter house, and/or necropsy room.
Costs
In addition to tuition and required U of MN fees, students will be assessed an Institute Fee ($132 per credit), which covers course materials, refreshment breaks, some meals and events, and the costs of course-related field trips. Students are responsible for the arrangement and payment of their transportation to and from Chiang Mai, Thailand and for room and board costs.
Who can attend
Students must obtain instructor permission and must be a mid to senior level career professional and a masters or doctoral-level student.
