London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

The overall module aim is to give students a conceptual and practical understanding of the multiple and complex links between various forms of global change (e.g. environmental, economic, political, technological and social) and human health worldwide.

Intended learning outcomes

Upon successful completion of the module, a student will be able to:

• Define key concepts such as global change, globalisation, global health and governance.
• Understand various drivers and forms of global change (e.g. environmental, economic), and their relationship with globalisation processes.
• Assess existing empirical evidence of the links between global change and health, and the methodological tools available to measure such links. 
• Cite a range of examples of global health issues in terms of their impacts on human health through case studies (e.g. on environmental change, infectious and non-communicable disease control, multilateral trade agreements).
• Examine the roles of different institutional actors, such as for-profit companies, multilateral organisations (e.g. WHO, World Bank), public-private partnerships, and foundations in global health.
• Describe the main challenges for responding effectively to global health challenges through improved global health governance in the form of effective health policies, institutional reforms, and international law and other forms of cooperation.

Session Content

The module is expected to cover the following topics:

• Key definitions and conceptual frameworks for understanding different types of global change taking place, the key drivers of globalisation, and the main features of shifts between national, regional and global health.
• Theoretical and methodological challenges of measuring links between global change and health. 
• Overviews of forms of global change related to global health in the social, economic, environmental and political spheres.
• Examples dealing with familiar public health issues from a global perspective (e.g. infectious and non-infectious disease, pharmaceuticals, tobacco control, alcohol; food; and human rights).
• Debates from policy areas and agendas outside the health sector impacting health at a global level (e.g. trade and trade organisations, security and human rights legislation, major industries of tobacco, alcohol, and pharmaceuticals, and environmental change). 
• Review of global health governance structures and forms of global health policies, institutional reforms, international law and other forms of cooperation.

Mode of delivery

This module is delivered predominantly face-to-face. Where specific teaching methods (lectures, seminars, discussion groups) are noted in this module specification these will be delivered by predominantly face-to-face sessions. There will be a combination of live and interactive activities (synchronous learning) as well as self-directed study (asynchronous learning).

Assessment

The assessment for this module has been designed to measure student learning against the module intended learning outcomes (ILOs) as listed above. Formative assessment methods may be used to measure students’ progress. The grade for summative assessment(s) only will go towards the overall award GPA. 

The assessment will take the form of a written assignment that brings together the conceptual and empirical content of the module to address a practical policy problem (1500 words).

Credits

• CATS: 15
• ECTS: 7.5

Module specification

For full information regarding this module please see the module specification.