GHHP 70: Global Response to Disasters and Refugee Crises - launching this Thursday!

GHHP is offering a new course this spring, GHHP 70: Global Response to Disasters and Refugee Crises, in the Ethics of Health category. The first class will be held this Thursday, January 28th from 1:00-3:00PM in Sever 203. Come check it out!

Course description: Climate change, urbanization, and conflict mean that global disasters are on the rise.  How should the world respond when disasters force people from their homes?  How can we better help the world’s refugees?  This course examines the past, present, and future of the international humanitarian response system.  We will explore how Doctors Without Borders, the United Nations, the Red Cross, and other aid agencies came to be and how global response standards, international humanitarian law, and new technologies are shaping worldwide disaster relief. 

Through interactive discussions and case studies, students will learn how aid workers interact with governments, militaries, and civil society to provide refugee aid.  At the end of the course, students can choose to live the refugee experience during a large-scale, three-day outdoor simulated humanitarian crisis together with other students and professional aid workers from around the world.

This course is team-taught by two emergency medicine doctors, Stephanie Kayden and Mike VanRooyen, from the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative.