The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) is calling for applicants for its new Postdoctoral Fellowship in Community-Based Research. CAMH trains students and fellows in the field of mental health and addictions and the purpose of the fellowship is to provide a postdoctoral fellow with training in the techniques and principles of community-based research on mental health and addictions. Fellows can propose research in any area related to mental health and addictions, and can be supervised by any CAMH scientist. In addition to the usual academic requirements of CAMH fellows, successful candidates for this fellowship will be required to show that: their proposed research question is seen as a priority for the community under study; community members and/or organisations will be actively and meaningfully engaged in the research; and the research is likely to have a tangible impact for the community.
Jobs and Announcements
UNRISD invites scholars with a proven track record in research and publication on issues related to domestic resource mobilization, taxation, public finance and governance, aid and political economy, to submit an expression of interest. Countries under consideration include (but are not limited to) Liberia, Uganda and Zimbabwe, and Bolivia, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. Expressions of interest are invited from potential country team coordinators who could lead, and put together, a team of researchers; and individual researchers who would be willing to join country research teams. Participating researchers will collaborate in developing a comparative methodology, undertake field work, draft reports and academic outputs, and engage in workshops, conferences, policy dialogues and other communication activities between January 2013 and December 2014.
In preparation for the 2013 United Nations (UN) General Assembly, the UN is inviting interested individuals and groups to submit “think pieces” on the positioning and role of health in the post-2015 agenda. The UN aims to garner experiences and lessons learnt from the health-related Millennium Development Goals and consider how these can be harnessed to ensure that health remains intrinsic to the new development agenda. Papers may also address disease-specific policy and programming challenges, health systems issues, measurement, monitoring and evaluation, or cross-sectoral action for health. Lessons learnt from the past should be used to highlight how new global goals, targets and indicators could be used to strengthen country action and tackle emerging challenges, such as enhancing health equity; building intersectoral links; using health action to achieve human rights, justice, peace and security; and involving communities, business and industry in successful, sustainable health action. Papers can be summaries of existing research and development activities or secondary analyses and discussion around key topics.
Durban’s hosting of the Brazil-Russia-India-China-SA summit in March 2013 requires critical civil society to share views ranging from local to global. the Durban 'counter-summit' supports bottom-up unity of peoples in these countries and their hinterlands, collaborating on analysis, advocacy and activism, including a community/labour/environmental teach-in on 23 March, reality tours on 24 March, a university-based conference on 25-26 March, and a rally outside the International Convention Centre on 27 March.
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) has announced the names of 70 new members and ten foreign associates during its 42nd annual meeting. Election to the IOM is considered one of the highest honours in the fields of health and medicine and recognizes individuals who have demonstrated outstanding professional achievement and commitment to service. New members are elected by current active members through a selective process that recognises individuals who have made major contributions to the advancement of the medical sciences, health care, and public health. Among the foreign recipients of the honour was Dr Diane McIntyre, South African Research Chair in Health and Wealth in the Health Economics Unit, School of Public Health and Family Medicine, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa. Dr McIntyre sits on the EQUINET Steering Committee.
A new African research fund has been launched by the Royal Society and the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DFID), called the Royal Society-DFID Africa Capacity Building Initiative. The fund is specifically designed to help form research consortia in Africa, arranging research exchange programmes between the United Kingdom and Sub-Saharan Africa. The scheme provides funding towards research expenses, travel and subsistence costs and PhD training, with limited funds for equipment and training in laboratories. The fund comes as part of a new collaborative initiative to strengthen research capacity in Africa by addressing the current skills gaps within higher education in Africa. Applications will be accepted in three research priority areas: water and sanitation, renewable energy and soil-related research.
Maker Faire Africa is a yearly pan-African maker faire and a community of makers. It gathers creative inventors, designers & fabricators that hail from Africa’s tiniest villages to expansive urban areas, with a shared commitment to origin, ingenuity & innovation. At the annual pan-African Maker Faire, local creators and manufacturers connect and redefine the future through authentic, African ingenuity.
CHESAI is calling for expressions of interest from African policy-makers and mid- to senior-level managers in the public health system in a short-term sabbatical of one to three months in Cape Town, South Africa. CHESAI is a four-year collaborative endeavour between the Schools of Public Health of the University of Cape Town (UCT) and the University of the Western Cape (UWC), funded by the Canadian International Development Research Centre (IDRC). UCT and UWC are engaged in research and policy development with health system decision-makers on a range of health policy and systems’ issues, and also offer teaching programmes in these fields. Applicants must be working as a policy maker or manager in the public health system in an African country and have substantial experience in public health sector management and leadership to share and draw on. The sabbatical is an opportunity for you to contribute to and participate in health policy and systems research activities, such as a seminar series, and the wider academic life of the hosting organisations, an opportunity to read and engage with other practitioners and with researchers working in this field, and you will be given space to write up and present some of your experiences, with the aim to publish a paper or article.
The theme of this year’s South African HIV Clinicians Society Conference is 'Striving for Clinical Excellence'. The Conference will focus on clinical content, setting it apart from other conferences held to date in South Africa. Doctors, nurses, and pharmacists are welcome to attend presentations by senior faculty members from the region and abroad delivering talks relevant to clinical care.
The International Health Economics Association (iHEA), which is hosting the July 2013 World Congress on Health Economics, is looking for abstracts and session proposals for the Congress. While all submissions in the field of health economics are welcome, the programme committee is particularly interested in the following topics: health care reform; universal coverage; health workforce; health technology assessment; econometrics; history of health economics; health status measurement; paying for health care; and reporting system performance. Session description and individual abstracts should not exceed 500 words.