SGLK13001U Global Health: Policy, Politics and Partners

Volume 2014/2015
Education
MSc Programme in Global Health - compulsory
Content

The course will introduce students to current and emerging global health issues and the hazards and determinants impacting human health and disease, ranging from individual to society. Some of the determinants examined include the changing role of different stakeholders, health policies, political issues, globalization of health work force, and cultural and social factors at local, national, regional, international and global levels. Issues of governance, particularly international cooperation, the international health architecture, and the role of international NGOs, will also be covered as well as issues of human rights and equity.

Theories and practices concerned with global health policy will be discussed, as will questions of how international policies, trade agreements, and global public goods concepts affect global health.  Key concepts such as equity,  the division of resources, and poverty will be discussed. Students will gain knowledge on methods used to search for and evaluate data. 

This part of the course furthermore introduces a health and human rights approach. Human rights are regarded as fundamental to public health work. Human rights abuses can dramatically affect health, health can be dramatically worsened when human rights are ignored, and health and human rights can act synergistically with each other for the improvement of global health. Thus the students will learn about the conceptual foundations of the health and human rights theme and how this framework can be applied in order to better understand and combat health problems in a globalized world including problems of social inequalities in health and inequities in access to health care.

Finally, students will also be introduced to, and learn to critically evaluate and choose between, a number of data sources which may be used to gather data to analyse global health issues; including building up and accessing local and global databases. 


Teaching:
The course is a mix of lectures and supervised discussions. It will include oral presentations by students. 

Learning Outcome

Course structure / general information:

The course covers the following themes:

  • Health, Equity and Human Rights
  • Global Health Architecture
  • Good governance, participation and democracy
  • Political Ideologies, welfare state systems and citizenship
  • Problem identification and power studies
  • Agenda setting, rational choice and historical institutionalism

On completion of the course, the students shall demonstrate knowledge on:

  • Exemplify knowledge of, and be able to discuss, the main international actors and global health policies of international organisations and political systems
  • Exemplify knowledge of and discuss equity in health and health and human rights.
  • Discuss good governance and democracy as well as political ideologies, welfare state systems and citizenship.
  • Illustrate knowledge of and be able to discuss problems regarding the political process and agenda setting.
  • Demonstrate analytical skills through the use of relevant international databases on health and health care.
  • Describe and discuss the concepts of equity and human rights in relation to global health.

 

Knowledge

On completion of the course, the students shall demonstrate knowledge on:

  • Values in international health including equity in health and human rights and health and how they may be applied on concrete cases
  • The international health architecture including its organization and political foundation/institutions.
  • Good governance and democracy as well as political ideologies, welfare state systems and citizenship.
  • Organisation analysis and problems in the political process and agenda setting in health care.


Skills

On completion of the course, the students shall demonstrate the ability to:

  • Describe, reflect on and discuss the above mentioned aquired knowledge.
  • Use and analyse data from relevant international databases on health and health care related to global health problems.
  • Apply analytical approaches to global health topics included in the course as learned through case work.


Competencies

On completion of the course, the students shall demonstrate the ability to:

  1. Describe and discuss the concepts of equity and human rights in relation to global health.
  2. Introduce and discuss main international actors and global health policies of international organisations and political systems
  3. Describe and discuss good governance and democracy as well as political ideologies, welfare state systems and citizenship.
  4. Introduce organisation analysis and problems in the political process and agenda setting.
  5. Use their analytical skills on relevant international databases on health and health care

 

 

The course will include a combination of lectures, student activating sessions and group work based on an assignment with supervision. The students will be introduced both to theories and empirical material on all of the course topics.
  • Category
  • Hours
  • Exam
  • 4
  • Exercises
  • 45
  • Lectures
  • 36
  • Preparation
  • 121
  • Total
  • 206
Credit
7,5 ECTS
Type of assessment
Written examination, 4 hours under invigilation
The students will answer one or more questions and must write a maximum of six pages.
Aid
Only certain aids allowed
All, except devices allowing for external communication.

The following programmes are available for the exam at Peter Bangs Vej:

Office (Word, Excel, Onenote and Powerpoint)
IO2 – digital pen
Panoramic Viewer
Paint
Calculator – Windows
R – Statistitc programme
ITX MC – multiple choice programme
Adobe reader
USB access – for usb keys with notes etc.

Marking scale
7-point grading scale
Censorship form
No external censorship
More than one internal examiner
Criteria for exam assesment

To achieve the maximum grade of 12, the student must be able to:          

  • Exemplify knowledge of, and be able to discuss, the main international actors and global health policies of international organisations and political systems; further able to discuss good governance and democracy as well as political ideologies, welfare state systems and citizenship.
  • Illustrate knowledge of agenda setting and good governance and show the ability to discuss problems regarding the political process and agenda setting.
  • Demonstrate analytical skills through the use of relevant international databases on health and health care.
  • Describe and discuss the concepts of equity and human rights in relation to global health.