I love Chapel Hill

I can honestly say that I am so thrilled to be here and am amazed at the opportunities that have been given to me. Wow. First of all, my Interdisciplinary Perspectives in Public Health class is a lecture series (from 5-7:30pm...bleh) where people from their specific disciplines in public health come and talk about what they are doing in the field and in the lab in public health. Our speaker tonight was Michael Merson who was head of the WHO's Global Program on AIDS from 1990-1995 and now serves in an advisory capacity for UNAIDS; The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria; The World Bank; and is a member of the Bill and Melinda Gate's Foundation's Global HIV Prevention Working Group. I felt I should have bowed in his presence. Amazing speaker...and amazing projects. He followed a very famous icon at the WHO, Jonathan Mann, who actually started the Global AIDS Initiative when no government would really touch the subject...(Yes, that means our government too...please research Reagan for starters) <--another poke at Reagan...I like doing that.

Sidebar - I would like to point out what Jerry Falwell said not too long after HIV/AIDS topics hit the media, "I believe that when one breaks the laws of nature and the laws of moral decency - And I do believe homosexuality is a moral perversion. When we go against nature, and God of course is the creator of nature, we therefore pay the prices for that. We do reap it in our flesh when we violate the laws of God."

*Sigh*...the outspoken who often shouldn't speak.


If you would like to watch an interesting and informative PBS Special on the "Age of AIDS" since the 1980's...go to:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/aids/view/
(It offers political, medical, and social insights into what was going on and what is still going on in terms of HIV/AIDS)


Needless to say, I am amazed at the resources that are being offered to us here. We have such diverse classes with people who have very different perspectives on this country and countries abroad. My Comparative Global Health Systems class has 2 guys from India, a guy from Kenya, a guy from Tanzania, a few people from South Korea, a guy from Germany, a girl from Spain, a guy from Bangladesh, as well as people who have traveled around the world working in clinics and public health programs. When we got to class yesterday (our first day because we started on Tuesday last week thereby missing Monday class), we were immediately told to get into groups and discuss a worksheet that included a developing country profile + 4 healthcare options that all had their ups and downs. OOOO - Puzzle! Unfortunately, this was like doing one of those Mosaic puzzles...which so far in my experience (and I believe the Michael's experience as well) are virtually impossible.

(Also - I am going to have to come up with more places to go and newer, cooler jobs to do internationally. When people ask me, "so where have you been?" and I answer, "Kenya, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Cuba," people say..."oh...hmmm...nice. I've been to Bangladesh, India, Tanzania, Guatemala, and Brazil." I am among equals and people who FAR exceed my knowledge or understanding of the system. I guess that's why I am in grad school though right?! Yay learning!)

I guess I will leave you with a Martin Luther King quote that I truly believe and am only beginning to understand.

"As long as there is poverty in the world, I can never be rich. As long as diseases are rampant...I can never be totally healthy...We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single dominant destiny and whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. For some strange reason, I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be." - Martin Luther King

Ciao,
Kat