Global health project: An organization conference for the Middle East

Last year the IPR generously funded our global history of health initiative with a seed grant. We used these funds to hold an organizational conference of global participants at Ohio State in May of 2007.  About 18 people from outside OSU participated from places as far away as Mongolia, South Korea and Lebanon.  Based on results from the conference, last fall we prepared a preliminary proposal to the Wellcome Trust for a large global project.  

 

The participant from Jordan in last May's conference was Moawiyah Ibrahim of Al-Isra Private University in Amman.  He is very eager to help us organize the data collection effort in the Middle East and Africa.  To this end, Prof. Ibrahim has contacted two universities in the region, which have invited a proposal for a conference that would focus on the Middle East:  American University of Dubai and University of Arab Emirates.  Professor Ibrahim is confident that if we can provide partial funding, at least to pay the expenses of American participants and perhaps a little of the other fixed costs, that he could arrange the rest.  The meeting would be held next January.

We are therefore writing to ask for seed money to fund this Middle East initiative of the global history of health project.  In addition to the American organizers of the global project, participants would include one of the leaders from the European effort (Charlotte Roberts of Durham University), the project's post-doctoral fellow, and approximately 20 researchers from the Middle East.  To establish good relations, we feel it is very important to meet in the Middle East. Moreover this makes financial sense because most of the participants would be from that region.