On March 2-3, 2011, the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine co-hosts the conference, The Long Tail of Global Health Equity: Tackling the Endemic Non-Communicable Diseases of the Bottom Billion. The conference seeks to focus attention on the non-communicable disease burden of the poorest populations, the bottom billion, largely composed of children and young adults. Held at the Joseph P. Martin conference center at Harvard Medical School, the conference is free and open to the public. 

The conference will bring together experts in conditions such as rheumatic heart disease, Burkitt’s lymphoma, malnutrition-associated diabetes, and the respiratory impact of household fuels as well as leaders in global health financing and those experienced in addressing infectious disease and mental health among the bottom billion. Some of the featured speakers include Paul Farmer, Dean Jamison, K. Srinath Reddy, and Peter Hotez. The conference is co-hosted by Partners In Health, Brigham and Women's Hospital, the Taskforce on Expanded Access to Cancer Care and Control in Developing Countries, and the Non-communicable Disease Alliance. Further details and registration are available at the conference web site.

In addition, we invite you to join the new GHDonline community focused on NCDs of the “bottom billion” led by conference director Gene Bukhman, MD, to connect with participants and discuss challenges in your community, and to view exclusive videos. More than 4,000 health implementers from 1,300+ organizations around the world collaborate in GHDonline communities to address a wide variety of health care delivery challenges, from patient adherence to preventing the transmission of tuberculosis. GHSM is a founding collaborator of GHDonline.