Interested in health and global issues? Want to make a positive change in the world? Become a disease detective this summer!
In this course, you will learn about current approaches to promoting health, preventing disease, and delivering health services to communities in need around the world. The course takes a broad, multi-disciplinary approach and explores how medicine, public health, international relations, economics, and other disciplines must be integrated to save lives worldwide. Recent emerging outbreaks, such as COVID-19, Ebola, and Zika, have captured headlines worldwide and illustrated how the intensification of global trade and travel facilitates the rapid spread of disease. The first half of the course will focus on our shared vulnerability to infectious diseases, and you will learn the fundamental approaches used to detect, control, and prevent infectious disease. We will examine historical and current examples of infectious disease outbreaks and learn the strategies used to predict, detect, control, and prevent infectious disease outbreaks locally and worldwide.
The second half of the course will focus on how inequity, poverty, gender, climate change, and corporate activity drive poor physical and mental health conditions. We will evaluate disadvantaged and marginalized countries and communities and explore and discuss how human rights law and principles of solidarity and justice can enhance health worldwide. We will also practice using various research approaches, ranging from traditional surveys to photo installations, to generate the evidence needed to advocate for policy changes.
We apply a very hands-on, practical approach through fun, daily individual and group exercises, as well as field trips. The course is appropriate for students interested in medicine, public health, anthropology, international relations, international business, economics, law, etc. — in other words, it’s for everyone interested in helping to protect and promote health around the world.
PROGRAM DATES
June 16 – July 13, 2024
PREREQUISITES
None
DAILY SCHEDULE & ACTIVITIES
MONDAY – FRIDAY
9:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Classes in session
12:00 p.m. – 1:30 p.m. Lunch
1:30 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. Classes in session
COURSE OVERVIEW
Highlights
- Learn from numerous guest lecturers, including current leaders in the field from L.A. County Department of Public Health and non-governmental organizations
- Investigate and solve disease outbreaks through hands-on outbreak investigations just like a real disease detective
- Discover the variety of academic and career options in the field of global health and social justice
- Build skills in effective reading, writing, and research methods
- Learn how to craft impactful public health messages
- Build personal relationships with leading global health faculty at USC
Topic of Study
- Trends in global burden of disease
- New and emerging infectious and chronic diseases
- COVID-19 outbreak and response
- U.S. and international laws, policies, and aid relating to health and pandemic response
- Roles of poverty, human rights, social justice, and cultural competency in promoting health worldwide
- Key global health leaders and organizations
- Environmental degradation and climate change
- Social determinants of health, including race, gender, and sexual orientation
- United Nations Sustainable Development Goals
- Social capital and community mobilization