Track 9 Programme
Click here to download a pdf of the Track 9 programme. **updated 24.9.21
You may also scroll through the programme online in the box below.
In Track 9, conference delegates will present and discuss their recent research on prevention and treatment of maternal, child and sexual and reproductive health problems. There will be interdisciplinary discussions, bringing together social, medical, and legal sciences.
Responsible: Ingvild F. Sandøy, Karen Marie Moland, Hilde Marie Engjom
Track 9 - Day 1 (28 Sept) 15:00
Name: Ass prof Salome Maswime
Institution: University of Cape Town, South Africa
Speciality: global surgery expert, esp. caesarean sections
Date: 28 Sept.
Time: 15:02-15:17
Title: The South African Obstetric Surveillance system, monitoring of maternal and perinatal health and consequences of the pandemic for reproductive health services in South Africa
Link to talk (will appear after conference – access to participants only)
Short bio
Salome Maswime is an associate professor and Head of Global Surgery at the University of Cape Town and an Obstetrician and Gynaecologist. She is in the leadership team of the South African Obstetric Surveillance System (SaOSS) on severe maternal morbidity and mortality. The SaOSS surveillance of COVID-19 in pregnant women in South Africa contributes population-based knowledge about the impact of the pandemic on maternal and perinatal health. Learn more from her university website.
Twitter: @MrsMaswime
Name: Ass prof Manisha Nair
Institution: University of Oxford, UK
Speciality: epidemiology and global population health research
Date: 28 Sept.
Time: 15:27-15:37
Title: Maternal and perinatal health and reproductive health services during the pandemic- the MaatHRI surveillance in India
Link to talk (will appear after conference – access to participants only)
Short bio
Manisha Nair is Associate Professor at Nuffield Department of Population Health at the University of Oxford. She has established a India-UK collaborative platform for maternal and perinatal health research (MaatHRI). This program has been used to evaluate the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic for maternal and perinatal health using population-based data from several Indian regions. Read more from her Oxford website.
Track 9 - Day 1 (28 Sept) 18:00
Name: Prof Lynn Morgan
Institution: Mount Holyoke College, USA
Speciality: medical anthropology, the anthropology of gender and sexualities and reproductive governance in Latin America
Date: Sept. 28
Time: 18:02-18:17
Title: Global Reproductive Governance: Connecting the Dots
Short bio
Professor Lynn Morgan is a specialist in medical anthropology; the anthropology of gender and sexualities and reproductive governance in Latin America. She is moreover a feminist science studies scholar. She has authored and edited three books -- Icons of Life: A Cultural History of Human Embryos (University of California Press, 2009), Community Participation in Health: The Politics of Primary Care in Costa Rica (Cambridge, 1993), and Fetal Subjects, Feminist Positions (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999) and a number of research articles. She has recently worked on the backlash against reproductive rights movements in Costa Rica, Argentina, and Mexico. Learn more.
Track 9 - Day 2 (29 Sept) 10:00
Name: Prof Andrea Whittaker
Institution: School of Social Sciences, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia.
Speciality: medical anthropologist, esp. reproductive health and biotechnologies, Thailand and SE Asia
Date: 29 Sept.
Time: 10:02-10:17
Title: Care, Commodification, and Stratification in Cross-Border Reproductive Travel
Short bio
Andrea Whittaker is professor at the School of Social Sciences, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. As a medical anthropologist, she specialises in the fields of reproductive health and biotechnologies with a special interest on Thailand and SE Asia. She leads the Health and Biofutures Focus Program within the Faculty of Arts. Her major publications include Intimate Knowledge: Women and their Health in Northeast Thailand (2000), Women’s Health in Mainland South-east Asia ed. (2002), Abortion, Sin and the State in Thailand (2004), Abortion in Asia: Local dilemmas, global politics ed. (2010) and Thai in Vitro: Gender, Culture and Assisted Reproduction (2015). Her latest book (2019) is International Surrogacy as Disruptive Industry in South-east Asia with Rutgers. Read more on her university website.
Track 9 - Day 2 (29 Sept) 15:00
Name: Dr. Venkatraman Chandra-Mouli
Institution: Department of Reproductive Health and Research, WHO
Speciality: Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health (ASRH)
Date: 29 Sept.
Time: 15:02-15:22
Title: Progress on adolescent sexual & reproductive health & rights (ASRHR). Which groups are being left out, why & what can be done about it?
Short bio
Dr. Venkatraman Chandra-Mouli leads the work on Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health (ASRH) in the World Health Organization’s Department of Reproductive Health and Research. His work includes building the epidemiologic and evidence base on ASRH and supporting countries to translate this data and evidence into action through well-conceived and well-managed policies and programmes. Learn more on his WHO website.
Track 9 - Day 2 (29 Sept) 18:00
Name: Prof. Claire Wendland
Institution: University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA
Speciality: medical anthropology, the anthropology of reproduction, sexuality and the body
Date: 29 Sept.
Time: 18:05-18:20
Title: Measures, models, and meaning-making: what counts when we account for maternal mortality
Short bio
Claire Wendland’s first book, “A Heart for the Work: Journeys through an African Medical School”, was published by the University of Chicago Press in 2010. Her current research project looks at changing concepts and loci of risk in childbirth in southeast Africa, in a setting in which very high maternal mortality rates force professionals and lay people alike to develop explanations for the link between birth and death. She seeks to understand how the narratives of maternal death they produce reflect experiences of a rapidly changing social, economic, and biomedical context. Learn more.
- is organised by the University of Bergen (UiB) on behalf of the Federation of European Societies for Tropical Medicine and International Health (FESTMIH)
- with enabling partners (Centre for International Health, UiB; Haukeland University Hospital; Global Health Norway, the Norwegian Research School of Global Health; and the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (RSTMH))
- and sponsors (Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute (Swiss TPH); the European & Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP); and Merck)
- and supported by the Research Council of Norway.
- The abstracts will be presented in a special issue of the Journal of Tropical Medicine & International Health (TMIH).