By Roshni Chakraborty Worldwide, countries have imposed lockdowns and issued stay-at-home orders to mitigate the community transmission of COVID-19. For many, however, staying at home poses a greater threat to their health than leaving. Activists and governments around the world have reported an alarming spike in domestic violence since social distancing measures were adopted. The United Nations has called for a domestic violence “ceasefire,” raising its concerns about a “horrifying…
January 13, 2020 For Immediate Release A new FXB Center for Health and Human Rights at Harvard University report underscores the need for innovative community strategies to prevent serious violations of children’s rights. The report, “Before, Not After: An Evaluation of CINI’s Preventative Approach to Child Protection in India,” authored by Elizabeth Donger and Jacqueline Bhabha, documents and evaluates the harm prevention work carried out by the children’s rights nonprofit…
In 2019, India launched the National Digital Health Mission to ready India’s health data ecosystem for the technologies of the future. There is also an urgent need to make health data portable, without comprising security and privacy. At this talk, Rahul Matthan and Satchit Balsari will discuss the implications of global and regional jurisprudence on the generation, exchange, and application of health data in India: Is consent enough? Can health…
Harvard FXB’s Dr. Satchit Balsari speaks at the workshop. On April 3rd, the India Digital Health Net (IDHN), a multidisciplinary research and development initiative established to support an Application Programming Interface-enabled (API) federated health data architecture in India, convened a workshop in New Delhi to learn from the several initiatives across the country that are building components of what may ultimately become India’s health tech grid. The workshop was organized with support…
This event in the Brown Bag Seminar Series, sponsored by the Harvard Chan Department of Global Health and Population, features Dr. Satchit Balsari, assistant professor in emergency medicine at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and Harvard FXB Fellow. In India, as around the world, there is vast excitement about the power of Big Data and Artificial Intelligence in advancing healthcare delivery. And yet, the vast majority…
Join Jacqueline Bhabha and Elizabeth Donger for a discussion about prevention science in child protection, with a focus on India. This seminar, with support from the Harvard University Asia Center, will explore the early findings of a research project that examines community-level strategies to prevent violence, abuse, and exploitation of children in India. The project involves three separate evaluations of harm prevention programs run by innovative Indian nonprofits in Uttar…
In July 2018, the Government of India’s policy think tank National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) invited feedback on their blueprint for a “National Health Stack.” The National Health Stack would provide the digital infrastructure or technical spine to support India’s recently announced National Health Protection Scheme extending coverage to 500 million people. In response, an interdisciplinary team of researchers and practitioners from across Harvard and India have published…
By Elizabeth Donger and Ayesha Mehrotra Every afternoon Meera walks around her neighborhood in Digha, a slum area on the banks of the Ganges in India’s Bihar State, knocking on the empty doorframes. A community protection volunteer with the nonprofit Aangan Trust, she targets families that she knows do not have Aadhaar cards, the national biometric ID card. She explains to parents that Aadhaar is essential for their children’s future,…
Dr. Satchit Balsari received a prestigious 2016 Dr B.C. Roy National Award from Pranab Mukherjee, President of India, at a ceremony in New Delhi on March 28, 2017. He was honored for outstanding services in the field of sociomedical relief. Dr. Balsari has long had an affiliation with the FXB Center for Health and Human Rights at Harvard University, currently as a Research Fellow. He is also an alumnus of…
Throughout the world, children flee peril in their place of origin, but often they exchange one set of dangers for another. A new report published today by Harvard University’s FXB Center for Health and Human Rights finds that protection for children on the move, particularly during time of transit, is lacking worldwide. Children on the Move: An Urgent Human Rights and Child Protection Priority, which began as a research project…
For immediate release: Monday, March 21, 2016 Boston, MA – Labor trafficking is a gross violation that affects hundreds of thousands of Indian children each year. Despite the Indian government’s considerable attention to the problem, the rescue and reintegration apparatus is beset by a range of problems that can leave children at risk of further harm, according to a new report published today by Harvard University’s FXB Center for Health…
by Karen Feldscher September, 24, 2015 — From July through September this year, up to 30 million people are traveling to the cities of Nashik and Trimbakeshwar in India to bathe in the holy waters of the Godavari River, as part of the Kumbh Mela Hindu religious festival. Amidst this mass gathering—supported by acres and acres of temporary parking lots, police stations, fire stations, health clinics, streetlights and toilets—a small…
by Angela Duger and Jacqueline Bhabha “These exceptions strip the reform of its power…” July 9, 2105. On May 13, 2015, the Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Modi, approved some far-reaching changes to India’s child labor laws.[1] This move brings the country one step closer to adopting the 2012 Amendment to the long outdated 1986 Child Labor Act, which has for nearly 30 years regulated child labor throughout India.…
