[Special Series]: Latha Samway: Planetary Health: the Impacts of Global Environmental Change on Patient and Planet

Wednesday, March 29, 2017 - 12:00 to 13:00
149 13th Street (Building 149), room 2204

Martinos Special  Mini-Series on Global Warming

Title: Planetary Health: The impacts of Global Environmental Change on Patient and Planet

About the Speaker

Latha Swamy’s work broadly examines the relationship between environmental degradation and human health. Her current research focuses on tropical resources, health systems strengthening and access, food justice and security, gender equity, postcolonialism, and the linkages between these in the midst of global environmental change – particularly their effects on those living in poverty, and innovative solutions that challenge the resulting systems of oppression. She was recruited to her current position as Senior Advisor in Planetary Health to Ernesto Zedillo (Chair of the new Rockefeller Foundation Economic Council on Planetary Health, Director of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, and former President of Mexico), and also advises on the Center's Universal Health Coverage Steering Committee.

During her studies at Yale University's School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, Latha worked in India and Nepal with the MIT Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab evaluating rural farmers’ social networks to promote new climate-smart agriculture technologies; in Haiti with Hôpital Albert Schweitzer transitioning smallholder farmers to agroforestry techniques to jointly address chronic malnutrition and massive deforestation; and in West Borneo, Indonesia conducting an independent program evaluation at a rural clinic (Health in Harmony) that aims to disincentivize illegal logging by providing reduced cost healthcare services in return for forest stewardship. 

Latha is a Global Health Justice Partnership Fellow at Yale Law School, serves as a UN Ambassador for Women’s Environment and Development Organization, and sits on the Junior Board of EcoHealth Alliance. Latha holds a Master in Environmental Management from Yale University, an M.Sc. in Neuroscience and Clinical Investigation from Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and a B.S. in Cellular Biology with a minor concentration in Percussion and Ethnomusicology from the University of Georgia.