Category: News

The number of people fleeing wars, violence, and persecution rose to 82.4 million people in 2020, an increase of four percent since 2019. The COVID-19 pandemic did not slow the rate of refugee displacement, despite pleas from the international community for a global ceasefire. The result was one percent of the world’s population (1 in 95 people) is now forcibly displaced. A decade ago, the worldwide number of displaced people was 1 in 159.

According to UNHCR Global Trends 2020 report, these numbers include people displaced for the first time as well as people displaced repeatedly, both within and beyond countries’ borders. Crises in Ethiopia, Sudan, Mozambique, Yemen, Afghanistan, Columbia, Syria, Venezuela, and more have displaced 20.7 million refugees’ under UNHCR’s mandate by the end of 2020, which another 48 million people were internally displaced within their own countries.  The COVID-19 pandemic affected the refugee population hard, who has faced increased food and economic insecurity and reduced health care access. At the height of the pandemic in 2020, over 160 countries had closed their borders, with 99 making no exception for people seeking protection. Per UNHCR data, poverty, food insecurity, climate change, conflict, and displacement are becoming more interconnected which is driving additional people to search for new homes.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, is calling for world leaders to increase efforts to cooperate to halt and reverse the decade-long trend of increased displacement led by violence and persecution, saying “Behind each number is a person forced from their home and a story of displacement, dispossession and suffering. They merit our attention and support not just with humanitarian aid, but in finding solutions to their plight.”

July 28, 2021 was the 70-year anniversary of the signing of Refugee Convention, a key international treaty establishing the right of people forced to flee their home countries. Since that date in 1951, millions of lives have been saved through this United Nations compact.

The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHRC), was established in 1950 by the United Nations in the aftermath of the horrors of the Second World War. The UNHRC statute was published in 1951, setting out the terms of its operations and instructing plenipotentiaries of 26 states to meet in Geneva to finalize the text of the Convention. UNHCR is the guardian of the 1951 Convention, with the mandate to supervise its application and to work with states to protect refugees and find durable solutions. The 1951 Convention and the 1967 Protocol, which broadened the scope of those in need of international protection, define who is a refugee and the kind of protection, assistance, and social rights they are entitled to receive. The principles of the Convention were reaffirmed in December 2018 by the Global Compact on Refugees, an outline for more equitable responsibility-sharing. Both the Convention and the Compact affirm that sustainable solutions to refugee issues cannot be achieved without international cooperation.

The Refugee Convention continues to protect the rights of refugees around the world and is a crucial component of international human rights law, remaining as relevant now as it was when it was drafted and agreed to 70 years ago. Filippo Grandi, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, says “The language of the Convention is clear as to the rights of refugees and remains applicable in the context of contemporary and unprecedented challenges and emergencies – such as the COVID-19 pandemic.” Mr. Grandi expressed alarm at recent attempts by some countries to disregard the Convention’s principles, including expulsions and pushbacks of refugees and asylum seekers at land and sea borders, and recent proposals to transfer refugees to third-party countries for processing without adequate protection or safeguards. Both the 1951 Refugee Convention and the more recent Global Compact on Refugees call for international cooperation to find a range of solutions for refugees.

The Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia (UPCH) has risen in the global ranking of best universities in the world by the QS World University Ranking, going from the score of 701-750 to 651-700. This year, QS analyzed 1,673 universities worldwide, of which 1,300 passed the minimum qualifications to be considered in the current ranking. In Peru, only eight universities were considered, among them the four universities that make up the Consortium: PUCP, UPCH, UP and ULIMA.

The QS World University Rankings is the world’s most popular source of comparative data on university performance where 8 evaluation indicators are considered, such as: academic and employer reputation, personnel with a doctorate, citations per article, impact on the web, among others. As a university, they have improved their standards in the indicators of 1) the ratio of students to faculty, 2) academic reputation, 3) employer reputation. This has allowed UPCH to improve their position in the world ranking and place 33rd in Latin America.

The President of the Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia (UPCH), Dr. Enrique Castañeda Saldaña, greeted the Minister of Health, Dr. Oscar Ugarte Ubillúz, at the university facilities for Ministry of Health’s supervision of the vaccination process against COVID-19, where volunteers are participating in the Sinopharm/China National Pharmaceutical Group vaccine clinical trial.

During the visit, Dr. Ugarte, accompanied by University authorities, toured each of the volunteers’ vaccination stations, verifying that the immunization process complies with the provisions of the Ministry of Health. The vaccination of the volunteers began May 24^th, with volunteers receiving either the placebo or the Sinopharm/China National Pharmaceutical Group vaccine. The trial is expected to inoculate 300 to 400 volunteers per day. Dr. Enrique Castañeda stressed the commitment of the University to vaccinate all volunteers in the clinical trial.

The visit was accompanied by Dr. Carlos Cáceres Palacios, Associate Provost for Research, Dr. Sergio Recuenco Cabrera, Principal Investigator of the Center for Clinical Studies-UPCH and Dr. Javier Bustos Palomino, Co-Investigator of the Center for Clinical Studies-UPCH.

In honor of Thailand’s National Dental Day on October 21^st, Khon Kaen University held a dental clinic for any Thai citizen who needed dental care. National Dental Day honors the Royal Grandmother’s birthday and is a tribute to HRH’s determination to promote good oral health among the Thai people. Since 1989, October 21 has been designated National Dental Health Day, where volunteer Doctors and Dentists under the Princess Srinagarindra Foundation provides dental care service to the public free of charge.

Khon Kaen University is one of the organizations that continuously holds dental care services for the Thai people on the National Dental Health Day every year. In 2020 KKU held activities that encouraged people to take care of their oral health. An opening ceremony was presided by Assoc. Prof. Waranuch Pitiphat, D.D.S., Dean of Faculty of Dentistry at KKU, which featured a donation by Khun Kanthachit Saranbandit, Manager of the HBA Product Category of Lion (Thailand) Co. Ltd. for the Faculty of Dentistry Fund for Patients with Oral Cancer. The event began with people registering for dental care at 8:00 a.m., and KKU students, faculty, professors, and staff welcomed them to the dental care room on the 2nd floor of Dental Hospital. The event also featured exhibitions of the Royal Grandmother and good oral health practices.

Over the past 20 years, Thailand has been successful in expanding oral health research capacity through a series of NIH D43 and D71 grants. As a result of this expansion, an exciting new creation has emerged from Khon Kaen University. The Nasal Creator Device has been developed for cleft lip and palate patients. It is used for forming and retaining the nasal morphology of patients during and after lip and nose surgeries. It serves as an efficient nasal retainer without the need for additional devices, and helps reduce the use of medical tape, which can cause skin allergies and irritations among some patients. After use, patients who use this device will see a nearly normal face shape. It’s available in various sizes which can be matched to Thai children. In conjunction with surgery, the use of this device helps improve the quality of medical treatment. This plays a vital part in the development of skull and facial morphology and articulation of cleft lip and palate patients.

This innovative device has won several awards, including the National Innovation Awards, Thailand Research Council, and the Silver Medal from the INNOVATION GENEVA. It has been certified by the National Health Security Office for use in the treatment for cleft lip and palate patients. It has been distributed to cleft lip and palate treatment centers in Thailand and Southeast Asia. No commercial launch of the product has been made. Kudos to Dr. Poonsak Pisek and his team on this successful innovation that will impact such a vulnerable population.

Despite efforts to improve oral health, low- and middle-income countries such as Kenya often lack the resources necessary to build research and health system capacity. Drs. Dalton Wamalwa, Ana Lucia Seminario, and Arthur Kemoli have been awarded an NIH D71 grant entitled “TABASAMU: A multidisciplinary collaboration on building up research capacity in oral health and HIV/AIDS”, which will be a collaboration among the University of Washington (UW), the University of Nairobi (UoN) and the Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi (KNH). This innovative D71 award will provide the basis for developing a training program with the goal of creating sustainable institutional capacity in research and training for oral health and HIV/AIDS.

The objectives of this award are to 1) Identifying Kenyan oral health and HIV stakeholders and conducting virtual and in-person interviews in Nairobi, Kisumu, and Mombasa about current oral health research capacity and needs, 2) Identify a pioneer generation of oral health researchers, conduct focus groups and gather data about access and barriers to research, and create a social network group of potential researchers, and 3) Organize, develop, and finalize our D43 grant application based on our findings.

Through this two-year planning grant beginning in 2021, we will have the capability to reach out to stakeholders and key investigators all over Kenya, identifying oral health champions and potential researchers who will play a pivotal role in defining an organizational structure to support a future HIV research training program in oral health.

Our manuscript publishing class for junior researchers in Kenya is off to a great start as classes began in March 2021. The project was made possible by the University of Washington’s (UW) Global Innovation Fund (GIF), with collaborative efforts between the UW, the University of Nairobi (UoN), and Moi University (MU). Ten students were enrolled in the virtual training program, led by an interdisciplinary team from the University of Washington and the University of Nairobi, including the UW Health Sciences and Suzzallo Libraries (Lynly Beard and Elizabeth Bedford), Global Health and School of Dentistry (Joe Zunt and Ana Lucia Seminario), MU School of Dentistry (Caroline Kilbosia), UoN School of Dentistry (Arthur Kemoli), and our class coordinator from California State University Northridge, Mink Lee.

The cohort has an equal representation of newly graduated junior investigators from the University of Nairobi and Moi University in Kenya, including one trainee from Uganda. These trainees come from diverse areas of the country, and seven out of ten are female. Utilizing virtual ‘breakout’ rooms has fostered active participation despite the challenges of an online environment. Their diverse professional backgrounds in oral healthcare allow them to share different perspectives and receive feedback from their peers.  The students are learning and enjoying camaraderie through sharing ideas, and support has come naturally for many, having graduated from the same universities. We hope that the program will provide the training and resources to increase the students’ manuscript submissions as we work towards expanding global oral health research capacity in Kenya.

The Timothy A. DeRouen Center for Global Oral Health was recently gifted an endowment by our founder and his wife, Tim and Cheryl DeRouen. This generous gift is earmarked to grow and expand the center, and to expand research capacity in oral health in low- and middle-income countries.

Dr. DeRouen is a University of Washington Emeritus Professor in the departments of Biostatistics, Oral Health Sciences, and Global Health. His roles in UW academic dentistry also included Associate Dean for Research and Interim Dean. He served as President of the American Association for Dental Research, and created the Summer Institute in Clinical Dental Research Methods, an intensive six-week interdisciplinary program in research methods designed for dental faculty working clinical areas that has now been offered for more than 25 years and attracted more than 560 faculty from 30 U.S. states and 54 foreign countries. As founder of the Timothy A. DeRouen Center for Global Oral Health, he served as PI on several NIH D43 grants which have expanded oral health research training capacity in Thailand and SE Asia.

We are very excited to receive this open endowment. Initial efforts for the generated funds will be for increasing research capacity through funding junior faculty in our partner sites, leading to expanding lines of research through their respective geographical areas and therefore decreasing inequalities in global oral health.

Make a Gift to the DeRouen Endowment Fund

Refugees often experienced trauma in their home country, and during the migratory process to neighboring countries and refugee camps. Studies have shown that refugees have worse oral health than the vulnerable and underserved populations of their host countries. Furthermore, oral care might consist of just emergent removal of teeth and or abscess treatment with antibiotics. Additionally, many host countries have no pediatric oral care or enough fluoride in water to prevent tooth decay. By the time their migratory process ends in the western world, many face new problems, including learning a new language, finding a job, educating themselves and their children, and generally adapting and acclimating to their new environment. By the time refugee families are in the United States, oral health can seem unimportant compared to the accumulated trauma before their final resettlement.

Washington state ranks third in the United States in the number of refugees it accepts. As a leader in the resettlement of refugees, identifying and addressing severe oral health disease is vital to early treatment and preventing further deterioration. With the generous support of Arcora Foundation, the refugee oral health project seeks to understand the processes of the initial refugee medical healthcare screening. Currently, the dental screening part of this process is just one question with a yes/no answer, asking if they have any dental problems. Given the cultural and linguistic differences and the fact that some refugees have never seen a dentist, it is essential to develop an evidence-based questionnaire to help identify severe oral health disease.

There are seven clinics that are responsible for the initial medical screening of the new refugees that arrive in Washington state. Five of these seven clinics have the capability to be refugees’ primary medical health care home. The potential for establishing oral health care referral, good oral hygiene practices through education, and follow-up referral is an opportunity that cannot be missed. However, establishing a good oral health screening process embedded within a refugee’s first contact with the healthcare system during the initial medical screening can identify problems and direct them towards oral health care immediately. We hope the refugee oral health project that UW’s Timothy A. DeRouen Center for Global Oral Health is conducting with funding from Arcora Foundation is the first step in strengthening the health status of arriving refugees in Washington.