Mass Starvation

Co-sponsored by: The TUSM Global Health Faculty Council, the Tufts Center for Global Public Health, and the Office for Institutional Inclusive Excellence at Tufts University.

Over the last six months, the war in the Gaza Strip has had dire public health consequences for its 2.2 million residents. The goal of this seminar is to communicate data and evidence regarding this ongoing and worsening public health crisis. Speakers will discuss recent spatial analyses of damage to civilian infrastructure that is critical for sustaining health (including water and medical facilities), challenges related to food insecurity and imminent famine, structural barriers to healthcare delivery before the current conflict, and the role of medical and public health specialists in times of conflict.

Speakers:

• Yara Asi, PhD, Assistant Professor, School of Global Health Management and Informatics, University of Central Florida
• Alex de Waal, DPhil, Executive Director, World Peace Foundation, Tufts University, Research Professor, Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University
• Karameh Hawash-Kummerle, MD, Assistant Professor of Neurology, Harvard Medical School, Attending Physician, Department of Neurology, Boston Children’s Hospital

This annual conference showcases medical research from fragile and conflict-affected settings. The event brings together researchers, innovators, and advocates in humanitarian global health for a day of presentations and debates.

This year, the Keynote Speech ‘Famine: what’s in a name?’ will be delivered by Alex de Waal, Executive Director of the World Peace Foundation, Tufts University.

A panel discussion entitled ‘Mortality estimates: more than just counting deaths?’ will be led by Leslie Roberts, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

Importantly, this year, it is 40 years since the famine in Ethiopia, 30 years since the genocide in Rwanda, and 10 years since the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, all of which were critical events that shaped MSF’s operations.

Access the full agenda  that includes the late-breaking abstract Crisis in Gaza: scenario-based health impact projections (LSHTM).

According to the Human Rights Watch, Israeli forces are deliberately blocking the delivery of water, food, and fuel, and using starvation of civilians as a method of warfare in Gaza which is a war crime according to international law. Join the Palestine Program for Health and Human Rights for a conversation about the starvation of civilians in the Gaza Strip. This webinar is co-sponsored by the Religion, Conflict, and Peace Initiative at the Harvard Divinity School, the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University, and the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy.

Speakers:

Alex de Waal, an expert on mass starvation and the Executive Director of the World Peace Foundation

Michael Fakhri, the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food and professor at the University of Oregon School of Law

Georgios Petropoulos, the head of the Gaza United Nations sub-office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA) in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Moderated by FXB’s Director of Research, Professor Jacqueline Bhabha, JD, MSc.