Driving Naari Programme launched in Chandigarh
Bengaluru: Over 300 delegates including leading researchers, practitioners, and policymakers in public health will be in the Bengaluru to attend the 3rd national conference on bringing Evidence into Public Health Policy (EPHP). The theme for the conference that will be held from July 7-9 at the Hotel Chancery Pavilion (Residency Road) is “Equitable India: All for Health and Wellbeing”. The Institute of Public Health, Bangalore and the Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp are jointly organising the conference in collaboration with the Department of Health and Family Welfare (Government of Karnataka), Indian Council of Medical Research (Government of India), the National Health Systems Resource Centre (Government of India) and Because Health (Belgian platform for global health).
After a day-long pre-conference workshop, the conference inauguration will take place from 6-8 pm in the presence of the eminent dignitaries including the Minister of health and family welfare (Karnataka), Dr. Abdul Ghaffar (Executive Director at WHO alliance on health policy and systems research, Geneva), Dr. Sanjiv Kumar (NHSRC, Delhi), Dr. KS Ravindranath (Vice Chancellor, Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences) and Dr. Bart Criel (Professor, Institute of tropical Medicine, Belgium).
“The third edition of the series of conferences that stared in 2010 is aimed at bringing researchers, practitioners and policymakers under one roof to facilitate facts-based and critical discussions on the Indian health system and its ongoing reforms,” said Dr. N Devadasan (Director, Institute of Public Health, Bangalore).
Dr. Werner Soors of the Institute of Tropical Medicine (Belgium) said that “this conference expands the scope of discussions beyond healthcare sector and will examine how policies and actions in various sectors impact health and wellbeing.”
“While we have seen improvement in population health parameters over time, health inequities – disparities in health outcomes across groups – are widening. It is timely that the EPHP 2016 is focusing on a central theme of health equity” said Dr. Vimala Patil (Director, Department of Health and Family Welfare, Karnataka).
Over 57 researchers from 11 states across India will present unreleased and peer-reviewed evidence for policymaking at EPHP. International experts from WHO (Geneva) and Institute of Tropical Medicine (Antwerp) among others will participate in the conference. Several state and national policymakers including senior government officials have confirmed their attendance to EPHP.
A special issue of one of the British Medical Journals (BMJ Global Health) will be launched as part of the conference carrying abstracts of all the work to be presented at the conference. This journal issue will be available in public domain for free access.
