Description | If any microbe or health behavior led to the number of deaths and displacement that war has, we would all be fully engaged in an emergency response. But for most health professionals, war is just wallpaper—the stuff going on in the background while we take care of the daily business of the opioid epidemic, violence, sharply rising suicide rates, the health effects of homelessness, and the constraints of austerity spending. Public health practitioners have not noticed our roles as accomplices in America’s failure to connect the dots. Life expectancy drops three years in a row, and we say nothing. Amy Hagopian is director of a University of Washington MPH degree program, Community Oriented Public Health Practice, which employs problem-based learning and focuses on social justice determinants of public health. She teaches a spring quarter course with Dr. Evan Kanter on “War and Health.” She led a team to estimate mortality associated with the 2003 invasion of Iraq and published research on leukemia rates in Basrah. She’s also researched the migration of health workers from poor countries to rich ones, and works on homelessness and incarceration as health issues. She is active in the American Public Health Association’s international health section and peace caucus, and is the 2018 recipient of the APHA’s Vic Sidel and Barry Levy Peace Award. She serves on the editorial board of the American Journal of Public Health, and on the Nuclear Weapons Task force of the Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility. Amy Hagopian, PhD Professor; Director, Community Oriented Public Health Practice |
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