Between April 5-11, the nation’s annual celebration of public health was honored at Brown with National Public Health Week events and activities supported by our partners at the SPH Careers Office, the Mindfulness Center at Brown, Wellness at Brown, Brown Recreation, and the RI Department of Health. Lectures, panel discussions, podcasts, and even exercise and mindfulness sessions were held on campus and online as part of the School of Public Health’s annual week-long festivities. A few highlights from #NPHW2021 follow.
Kathryn Thompson, HSR PhD student 
Ashley Gomez, BSHS PhD student 
Destry Jensen, MPH student
The Barnes Lecture
FEATURING PAUL FARMER MD, PH.D.
Dean Ashish Jha was joined by medical anthropologist and physician Paul Farmer, the co-founder and Chief Strategist of Partners In Health for the 2021 Barnes Lecture. Dr. Farmer, who has dedicated his life to improving health care for the world’s poorest people, discussed strategies for improving delivery of high-quality care in resource-poor settings. The lecture is supported by The Dr. and Mrs. Frederick W. Barnes, Jr. Lectureship in Public Health, through the generosity of Mr. and Mrs. James S. Zisson ’74, in memory of Norma and Miles Zisson ’38.
Public Health Research Day
The School of Public Health’s annual conference highlights the research accomplishments of our students, trainees, and partners. For this year’s virtual session, participants presented their posters live via Zoom to guests and judges who were able to visit poster presentations virtually as they would at an in-person conference. All members of the Brown community are invited to explore the Research Day posters to learn more about Brown students’ high-impact public health work.
Best Undergraduate Poster
Taylor-Marie Vasil: Evaluating Housing Characteristics Associated with Childhood Lead Poisoning in Providence, Rhode Island
Best Master’s Posters
Langa Bakhuluma-Ncube (MPH): Longitudinal Effects of Home-Based Self-HIV Testing on Attitudes, Norms, and Motivation among Men who have Sex with Men in the United States
Alexander Li (ScM Biostatistics): Simulating Virus Detection with Nanopore Sequencing, BLAST, and the Hypergeometric Distribution
Best Doctoral Poster
Alexandria Macmadu (Ph.D. Epidemiology): Crack Cocaine Use Frequency Is Associated with HIV Disease Severity Independent of Antiretroviral Therapy Exposure
MPH Alumni Panel: Advancing Racial Equity
The School of Public Health’s Office of Diversity & Inclusion hosted an alumni panel highlighting the transformative work of three MPH alumni focused on advancing racial equity in public health. Panelists included Monique J. Brown Ph.D., MPH ’09, assistant professor of epidemiology and biostatistics, Arnold School of Public Health, University of South Carolina; Shane Lloyd MPH ’11, Inclusion and Engagement Leader, Worldwide Consumer at Amazon; and Catherine Nwachukwu MPH ’17, Manager for Strategy and Research at the Center for Health Information and Analysis.
Special Podcast Series
Host Megan Hall MPH’15, spoke with five experts from across the School for a special Humans in Public Health podcast series. The five-part series covers topics ranging from household toxins and homelessness, to anxiety, race, public outreach, and more. The series includes interviews with Amy Nunn, professor of behavioral and social sciences and of medicine, director of the Rhode Island Public Health Institute; Joseph Braun, associate professor of epidemiology, director of the Center for Children’s Environmental Health; Sara Caniglia, second year MPH student; Dr. Jud Brewer, associate professor of behavioral and social sciences and of psychiatry and human behavior, director of Research and Innovation at the Brown Mindfulness Center; and Lorin Crawford, RGSS Assistant Professor of Biostatistics and senior researcher at Microsoft Research New England.
