21st Century Science

Holly Baker, Ph.D.

A key aspect of public health is empowering disenfranchised groups, such as women and gender minorities, to advocate for their health. The Center on Gender Equity and Health (GEH) is an action-oriented collective of researchers, policy specialists, and development experts working to eliminate gender inequities through impactful, community-based research. Professor Holly Baker, Ph.D., a faculty member within the center, has worked around the world to promote family planning and reduce gender-based violence in low- and middle-income countries.

“Studying the social networks and power dynamics between men and women is essential for promoting public health, as these dynamics can greatly impact women’s ability to advocate for their own health and wellbeing,” she said.

Baker, along with Rebecka Lundgren, Ph.D., M.P.H, GEH co-executive director and associate professor at UC San Diego School of Medicine, led the Agency for All Initiative, an international, multi-institutional effort to better understand and promote agency for individuals, communities and local organizations in low- and middle-income countries. According to Baker, one of the most important aspects of promoting agency at the community-level is capacity-building, the process of helping communities or organizations develop the skills and resources needed to solve problems without relying on external support from Western countries. While the initiative was originally funded by a historic $38 million grant from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and was intended to last from 2022 to 2027, the project was recently terminated.

“Capacity-building is helping people develop critical thinking skills, helping them develop their research skills, helping them get access to the resources they need to be working with their own communities,” she said. “This is ultimately a form of diplomacy.”

Georgia Kayser, Ph.D.

Another critical aspect of improving public health is understanding and addressing the environmental factors that impact people’s health. Assistant Professor Georgia Kayser, Ph.D., is dedicated to improving water sanitation, hygiene and water quality locally and globally. Her research has spanned over 20 countries across Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and Asia, where she has explored the factors that limit access to these essential services. She also works to identify interventions to improve public health.

“It is sometimes easy to take safe water for granted when you have access to it; however, 2.2 billion people around the world lack safely managed drinking water,” said Kayser. “My work seeks to understand why some communities are not able to access safe water; together with students and collaborators from around the world, we work with local organizations to tackle these problems.”

As deputy director of the UC Global Health Institute’s (UCGHI) Center for Planetary Health, Kayser is also fostering interdisciplinary research on planetary health, with a focus on informing environmental health programs and policies and providing training and research opportunities for students across the University of California.

“One of the unique aspects of UCGHI’s Center for Planetary Health is that we bring together people from a wide range of disciplines beyond public health, such as veterinarians, geochemists and economists,” said Kayser. “One of the biggest strengths of collaborating across the UC system is leveraging varied perspectives and interdisciplinary expertise to solve global health problems.”

Michael Pratt, M.D., M.S.P.E., M.P.H.

For many years, physical activity was not considered an important area of study for public health scholars. This is something that Professor Michael Pratt, M.D., M.S.P.E., M.P.H, a veteran expert in physical activity and public health, has spent his decades-long career working to change, first at the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and now at UC San Diego.

“It has taken three decades for us to normalize the fact that physical activity is one of the most important underlying health behaviors. It significantly reduces the risk of many chronic diseases, and a lack of physical activity can be attributed to millions of preventable deaths per year,” he said.

In 2014, Pratt co-founded the multi-institutional Global Observatory for Physical Activity (GoPA!), which tracks physical activity data globally with the goal of influencing policy change. By making physical activity data publicly available for the majority of countries and advocating for physical activity through their academic publications, GoPA! is making a lasting impact on the global community. Since the Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health was founded in 2019, Pratt has continued advancing health policy in physical activity. For example, this summer, Pratt traveled to Germany on a Fulbright project grant to help update Germany’s health recommendations for physical activity.