Women's Health Interrupted

In this episode, Dr. Siwan Anderson talks about how women’s socio-economic status strongly correlates with their health outcomes, especially Intimate Partner Violence (IPV). Dr. Anderson discusses some interesting findings in her research on how women are less likely to suffer abuse if they have access to a share of the household. Her current research looks at the women’s relationships with power in the household and how religious and cultural norms come into play in this context.

Links to resources mentioned in this episode/further reading material:

"Intimate Partner Violence and Female Property Rights" Nature Human Behaviour, 2021, 5: 1021-1026.

“Missing Unmarried Women” (with Debraj Ray) Journal of the European Economic Association, 2019, 17(5): 1585-1616.

“Unbundling Female Empowerment”

“How Economics can Contribute to Evolutionary Perspectives on the Family” (with Chris Bidner)

“Property Rights over Marital Transfers”(with Chris Bidner) Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2015, 130(3): 1421-1484.

Guest bio:

Dr. Siwan Anderson is a professor in the Vancouver School of Economics at the University of British Columbia. Her research area is applied development economics and much of her work centers on women in developing countries. She has worked on determinants of female autonomy, missing women, and marriage markets in various contexts. Dr. Anderson is a Research Fellow at the Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development (BREAD) and the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), and a Faculty Associate at the Center for Effective Global Action (CEGA) at the University of California, Berkeley. She is also a member of the Institutions, Organizations, and Growth research group of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research. Dr. Anderson is the first woman to receive the John Rae Prize, awarded by the Canadian Economic Association.

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In the second episode of our mini series, we talk to Dr. Veena Sriram about the role of power structures, such as gender, in global healthcare systems and policies. She highlights the importance of interdisciplinary study between public health and social sciences to better critically analyze healthcare systems.

Resources Discussed:

Veena’s papers that questions were based on:

• Introduction to “Recontextualizing Physician Associations: Revisiting Context, Scope, Methodology”
• Heroes on Strike: Trends in Global Health Worker Protests During COVID-19
• 10 best resources on power in health policy and systems in low- and middle-income countries

Resource Veena gave for context

• DELIVERED BY WOMEN, LED BY MEN:

A GENDER AND EQUITY ANALYSIS OF THE GLOBAL HEALTH AND SOCIAL WORKFORCE

• https://www.healthaffairs.org/do/10.1377/forefront.20200630.939347/

Guest Biography:

Dr. Veena Sriram is an Assistant Professor with a joint appointment in the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs (SPPGA) and the School of Population and Public Health (SPPH) at the University of British Columbia. Her research sits at the intersection of global health, social science and public policy, and her interests are in understanding power and politics in health policy processes in low- and middle-income countries. She draws upon theory and methodologies from the social sciences in conducting her research, and has a particular focus on qualitative approaches. Dr. Sriram has conducted extensive research at the national and state level in India, exploring a range of health policy and system questions, including medical specialization, health workforce policy development, the functioning of national health authorities and emergency care systems. She has also contributed to expanding the application of theory and concepts to study power in health policy and systems research.

(c) 2022 UBC Medicine Learning Network

In this episode of our mini-series, we talk to Dr. Elif Sari about how the notion of “becoming sick” is related to people’s migration experiences, especially those who are part of the 2S/LGBTQIA+ community. Dr. Sari discusses how this notion is rooted in the idea of harsh working environments and discriminatory practices of healthcare. She also addressed how both of these factors contribute to the emotional and physical wellbeing of these people.

Guest bio:

Dr. Elif Sari is a queer feminist anthropologist, a new faculty member in the UBC Department of Anthropology, and an uninvited immigrant settler on the unceded Coast Salish territories of the xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam) First Nation. She completed her Ph.D. (2021) in anthropology at Cornell University with a concentration in feminist, gender, and sexuality studies. After graduate school, Dr. Sari spent one year at the University of Toronto, where she had a chance to work in the Queer and Trans Research Lab as the Martha LA McCain postdoctoral fellow. Currently, she is working on her first book manuscript, which is an engaged ethnography of queer and trans asylum from the Middle East to North America. She is also excited to start two new research projects, one focusing on private refugee sponsorship in Canada and one exploring the connections between migration, sexuality, and art (particularly drag).

Links to resources mentioned in this episode/further reading material:

Additional resources on asylum in and through Turkey:

Amnesty International. 2016. “No Safe Refuge: Asylum-Seekers and Refugees Denied Effective Protection in Turkey.” https://www.amnesty.org/download/Documents/EUR4438252016ENGLISH.pdf

Biehl, Kristen. 2015. “Governing through Uncertainty: Experiences of Being a Refugee in Turkey as a Country for Temporary Asylum.” Social Analysis 59 (1): 55–75.

On LGBTQ asylum in Turkey:

Durmaz, Nursel, Hakan Topateş, and Aslıcan Kalfa Topateş. 2017. “Working Life Experiences of Iranian LGBTI Migrant Workers in Denizli Province in Terms of Occupational Health and Safety.” Mesleki Sağlık ve Güvenlik Dergisi (The Journal of Occupational Health and Safety) 17(64): 37-43.

HYD and ORAM. 2009. “Unsafe Haven: The Security Challenges Facing Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Asylum Seekers and Refugees in Turkey.”https://hyd.org.tr/attachments/article/166/unsafe_haven_2011.pdf

KAOS GL. 2016. “Waiting to be ‘Safe and Sound’: Turkey as LGBTI Refugees’ Way Station.” https://kaosgldernegi.org/images/library/2016multeci-raporu2016.pdf.

Sarı, Elif. 2020. “Unsafe Present, Uncertain Future: LGBTI Asylum in Turkey.” In Queer and Trans Migrations: Dynamics of Illegalization, Detention, and Deportation. Eithne Luibhéid and Karma Chávez, eds. Pp. 90-105. University of Illinois Press.

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In this week’s episode, Rebecca and Sidney sit down to talk with Dr. Jade Boyd, of the BCCSU to discuss the gendered impacts of drug use and drug policy. They go over some of the ways in which researchers, harm reduction services, and state services could all better support women who use drugs. Dr. Boyd also highlights the intersectional nature of drug use stigma and the need to incorporate research into drug policy.

Links to resources mentioned in this episode:

British Columbia Centre on Substance Use:

https://www.bccsu.ca

Sister Space - Women-only overdose prevention site:

https://atira.bc.ca/what-we-do/program/sisterspace/

FIR Square - Harm reduction for pregnant women and women with newborns:

http://www.bcwomens.ca/our-services/pregnancy-prenatal-care/pregnancy-drugs-alcohol

Biography:

Dr. Jade Boyd, PhD, is a Research Scientist with the BC Centre on Substance Use and Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of British Columbia. She draws upon qualitative, ethnographic and community-based methods to examine social, structural and environmental factors that impact people who use drugs, with particular emphasis on how gender—intersecting with race, class and sexuality, influences drug policy and practice. In her role with the BCCSU, Dr. Boyd collaborates with local and national peer-based, drug user-led groups, as well as leads a program of qualitative and community-based research activities investigating drivers of drug-related harms among women, including barriers to harm reduction and the criminalization of women who use drugs.

(C) 2022 UBC Medicine Learning Network

In this episode, Rebecca sits down with Jaime Charlebois and Patricia Tomasi, co-Founders of the Canadian Perinatal Mental Health Collaborative, which advocates for the treatment of all individuals during preconception, pregnancy, and the postpartum periods. We get into the topic of perinatal mental health and how advocacy platforms can be used to inform policy and to improve perinatal mental health care.

Links to resources mentioned in this episode:

Canadian Perinatal Mental Health Collaborative (CPMHC): https://cpmhc.ca/

You Are Not Alone: An anthology of perinatal mental health stories from conception to postpartum

• Amazon: https://www.amazon.ca/You-Are-Not-Alone-conception/dp/1989664083
• Indigo: https://www.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/you-are-not-alone-an/9781989664087-item.html

Biographies:

Jaime Charlebois is the Perinatal Mood Disorder Coordinator at Orillia Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital and Regional Volunteer Coordinator for Postpartum Support International. She is also the Co-Founder & Research Director of the Canadian Perinatal Mental Health Collaborative, non-profit lobbying the federal government to create a perinatal mental health strategy. Ms. Charlebois holds a Master of Science in Nursing, a Perinatal Nursing Certification from the Canadian Nurses Association, and a Perinatal Mental Health certification from Postpartum Support International. Her work experience includes 16 years of clinical nursing, seven years in higher education, and seven years in clinical leadership positions. She collaborates at the local, provincial, and national levels with multiple organizations and committees

Patricia Tomasi is a mom of two who struggled to find help for perinatal mental illness. She is a former journalist, turned fierce advocate, who went from writing about the state of maternal mental health in Canada as a reporter for HuffPost Canada to lobbying the federal government for a national perinatal mental health strategy. She is the Co-founder and Communications Director for the Canadian Perinatal Mental Health Collaborative and the Founder of the cheeky Maternal Mental Health Matters Blog. She started the private Facebook Postpartum Depression & Anxiety Support Group in 2017 where thousands of women from around the world support each other 24/7. Prior to her advocacy work, Patricia spent a decade providing communications and media relations expertise for the Ontario government, and in addition to HuffPost Canada, she worked as a reporter for CTV and CBC News in Vancouver, Toronto, Timmins, and Thunder Bay.