November 30, 2005

Global Health Sciences Seminar and Lecture Series
Global Health Sciences: Where Is It Heading?
Dr. Haile Debas

By Lutz Wong, Global Health Sciences

Dr. Haile T. Debas, Executive Director of UCSF Global Health Sciences, presented a seminar in which he addressed the downside of globalization for developing countries, particularly Sub-Saharan Africa. He also shared his thoughts about the future of UCSF Global Health Sciences.

While many developed countries have benefited from globalization, the same cannot be said for developing countries. "As far as Africa is concerned most have not seen the benefits of globalization. Indeed where Africa is concerned, the dark side of globalization is more obvious than the bright side. Sub-Saharan African countries feel keenly the exclusion, protectionism and insensitivity to their local culture that attend the globalization process in Africa," said Dr. Debas.

Because of subsidized farming and high technology in Europe and the United States, Sub-Saharan Africa can't compete and are therefore losing the market in agricultural products like cotton, coffee, and bananas. As a result, Africa continues to lose ground in the world trade share as well as foreign investments. Today, more than 300 million people in developing countries earn less than $1 per day.

To counter this downward shift, Dr. Debas recommends that developed nations help developing countries attain the means to gain shares in the market trade and become more self-sustained. "My personal view is that our approach should be to help developing countries achieve the capacity they need in human resources, institutions and infrastructure to be active players in and beneficial of globalization. At the same time, unfair trade practices and patent restrictions would need to be lifted."

To aid developing nations through building human and infrastructure capacity, UCSF established Global Health Sciences (GHS). One of its goals is to educate science and health p professionals from various disciplines, both at UCSF and in developing nations, and train them in global health. GHS creates international health projects and programs to bring attention to the effects of poverty, infectious diseases and chronic illnesses in developing countries. "In research led by Nancy Padian, the goal is not to duplicate work that's already going on in the campus, but rather it is to stimulate multi-disciplinary research by bringing together interested faculty from other schools around new cross-cutting themes."

GHS continues to move forward in its educational programs, including certificates in global health for current graduate students and as an area of concentration for current medical students. Students from the Kenya Medical Research Institute will arrive on campus in the spring to participate in a sandwich training program in non-HIV sexually transmitted diseases, and in the future a Ph.D. and Masters of Science degrees will be offered.

About Dr. Haile Debas:
Haile T. Debas, MD is executive director of the UCSF Global Health Sciences, the Maurice Galante Distinguished Professor of Surgery, dean emeritus of the School of Medicine, vice chancellor emeritus for medical affairs, and chancellor emeritus at University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Debas was born in Eritrea, a small country in northeast Africa, bordered by Sudan in the west, Ethiopia in the south and Djibouti in the southeast. From there, he received his M.D. from McGill University, and completed his surgical training at the University of British Columbia. He has held leadership positions with numerous membership organizations and professional associations. One of the few surgeons to be elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, he is also a member of the Institute of Medicine. He currently serves on the United Nations Commission on HIV/AIDS and Governance in Africa and on the Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy of the National Academy of Sciences.

About Global Health Sciences:
UCSF Global Health Sciences was established in 2003 to create a vision and provide institutional leadership for global health at UCSF. Under the direction of Haile T. Debas, MD, and reporting directly to Chancellor J. Michael Bishop, its creation underscores UCSF’s commitment to global health and to the care of vulnerable populations at home and throughout the world.