Rising Global Cancer Pandemic
About the Conference
Cancer is the first or second cause of death in 134 countries, the leading cause of death in most high-income countries, and the leading cause of death by disease in American children. An estimated 19.3 million new cases of cancer are diagnosed across the world each year, and this number is expected to rise to 24 million by 2035. Most of the increase will occur in low and middle-income countries–the countries least capable of confronting the cancer pandemic or of affording costly therapies.
Cancer is unjust. Striking inequalities are seen within and between countries in cancer incidence and survival by race, ethnicity, and socio-economic-status. Survival is much higher among the wealthy than among the poor. Outcomes are much more favorable among Whites than among Blacks and Latinos. The goal of this conference is to elucidate these inequalities and to examine the forces responsible for them through the lenses of both science and ethics.
Hosted by the Program for Global Public Health and the Common Good in the Schiller Institute for Integrated Science and Society in partnership with the Theology Department of the Morrissey College of Arts and Sciences, this conference marks the start of the third year of the increasingly popular minor in Global Public Health and the Common Good at Boston College. It will build on the success of our 2019 conference on Ethical Challenges in Global Public Health: Climate Change, Pollution and the Health of the Poor. It also marks the 50-year anniversary of the National Cancer Act signed into law by the U.S. President Richard M. Nixon in 1971.
The conference will bring together a distinguished group of scholars–from Boston College, across the United States, and internationally–in ethics, law, public policy, economics, global public health, and cancer prevention to examine the ethical challenges facing global cancer control in the 21st century.
The conference will fill an important gap in the debates and literature on the cancer pandemic. Despite the clear connections between global public health and social justice, there has been surprisingly little scholarly exploration of the ethical challenges that confront global cancer control. We anticipate that this conference will advance the emerging field of global health ethics.
The conference will be held in-person on the Chestnut Hill campus of Boston College and it is open to the public. For conference participants and guests who are unable to attend in-person, all sessions will also be available via Zoom webinar format. Registration is required for both in-person and remote attendees. For in-person attendees, Covid-19 vaccination is strongly encouraged. All registered participants will be informed by email of any emerging pandemic-related requirements.
Saturday, October 2, 2021 | Corcoran Commons | Register (in-person) | Register (virtual) | |
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| 8:30am-9:00am | Convening
Newton Room, Light continental breakfast. |
| 9:00am-9:50am | Opening Remarks
Questions and Answers (10’) Moderator: Thomas C. Chiles – Boston College |
| 9:50am-10:10am | Coffee Break
Boston Room |
| 10:10am-11:30am | The Changing ContextHeights Room
Questions and Answers (20’) Moderator: Laura J. Steinberg – Boston College |
| 11:30am-12:50pm | Legal and Political ProtectionsHeights Room
Questions and Answers (20’) Moderator: M. Cathleen Kaveny – Boston College |
| 12:50pm-1:30pm | Lunch Break and Students' Poster Session
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| 1:30pm-2:50pm | Ethical Issues and Practical ApproachesHeights Room
Questions and Answers (20’) Moderator: Danielle Sanchez – AstraZeneca |
| 2:50pm-4:10pm | International Perspectives: Major Cancer Problems and Prospects for Prevention
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| 4:10pm-4:30pm | Coffee Break
Boston Room |
| 4:30pm-5:30pm | Panel: Surviving Cancer
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| 5:30pm-6:10pm | Looking at the Future
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| 6:10pm-7:00pm | Reception and Students’ Poster Session
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Speakers
Thomas C. Chiles, PhD
Thomas Chiles is DeLuca Professor in Biology and Vice Provost for Research and Academic Planning and at Boston College. He received his B.S. in Microbiology and Cell Science from the University of Florida, and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Florida College of Medicine. He was also a post-doctoral fellow at Boston University School of Medicine in the Immunology/Oncology Training Program, as a Ruth L. Kirschstein NRSA fellow.
At Boston College, he served as Chair of the Biology Department. He also served on several National Institutes of Health study sections, including Hypersensitivity, Autoimmune and Immune-mediated Diseases and currently on the Cancer Biology special emphasis panel at the National Cancer Institute.
He was member of numerous editorial boards, including as Section Editor for the Journal of Immunology. He is a member of the American Association of Immunologists and American Society of Hematologists. He is currently serving on the editorial board of Frontiers in Immunology and served on the Commission on Pollution, Health and Development in partnership with the Lancet, the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution, and the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York.
Kurt Straif, MD, PhD
Kurt Straif is currently Visiting Professor of Epidemiology at Boston College. After medical studies in Liège (Belgium), Heidelberg and Bonn (Germany), he started his career in internal medicine in Bonn. With a fellowship of the German Academic Exchange Office he pursued an M.P.H. at UCLA. Later, in Germany, he was assistant professor at the University of Giessen, focusing on occupational, environmental, and social medicine, and an assistant and associate professor in epidemiology and social medicine at the University of Muenster. At the same time, he completed a Ph.D. in epidemiology at the UCLA, with a focus on cancer epidemiology and epidemiologic methods.
Since 2001, he had leading positions at the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), as a senior epidemiologist, Head of the IARC Monographs programme, to classify carcinogenic hazards of all kinds of environmental exposures (chemical, biological, physical agents, and personal habits), Acting Head of a large epidemiological research group, and initiator of large international projects.
In 2014, he relaunched the IARC Handbooks of Cancer Prevention with a broad perspective on prevention (breast cancer screening, avoidance of obesity, and colorectal cancer screening). Since 2017 he also supervises the WHO Classification of Tumours (“Blue Books”). In 2016 he received the Champion of Environmental Health Research Award in commemoration of fifty years of Environmental Health Research by the National Institutes of Health. In 2018, he presented the Distinguished Lecture in Occupational and Environmental Cancer at the U.S. National Cancer Institute.
Andrea Vicini, S.J., MD, PhD, STD
Andrea Vicini is Michael P. Walsh Professor of Bioethics and Professor of Moral Theology in the Boston College Theology Department and an affiliate member of the Ecclesiastical Faculty at the School of Theology and Ministry. M.D. and pediatrician (University of Bologna), he is an alumnus of Boston College (S.T.L. and Ph.D.), and holds an S.T.D. from the Pontifical Faculty of Theology of Southern Italy (Naples). He taught in Italy, Albania, Mexico, Chad, and France. He is co-chair of the international network Catholic Theological Ethics in the World Church. His research and publications include theological bioethics, sustainability, global public health, new biotechnologies, and fundamental theological ethics.
Philip J. Landrigan, MD, MSc, FAAP
At Boston College, Philip Landrigan is Director of the Global Public Health and the Common Good program and director of the Global Observatory on Pollution and Health. He is a pediatrician, public health physician, and epidemiologist. Author of over 700 scientific publications and 10 books, in his research he uses the tools of epidemiology to elucidate connections between toxic chemicals and human health, especially the health of infants and children. He is particularly interested in understanding how toxic chemicals injure the developing brains and nervous systems of children and in translating this knowledge into public policy to protect health.
In New York City, he worked for many years in the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and he was involved in the medical and epidemiologic follow-up of 20,000 9/11 rescue workers. From 2015 to 2017, he co-chaired the Lancet Commission on Pollution and Health.
Raja M. Flores, MD
Raja Flores is the Chairman of the Department of Thoracic Surgery, and Steven and Ann Ames Professor in Thoracic Surgery at The Mount Sinai Medical Center. He is a recognized leader in the field of thoracic surgery for his pioneering efforts in the treatment of mesothelioma and implemented the current program for this procedure at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. He was a lead investigator in a multicenter trial of neoadjuvant alimta/cisplatin, extrapleural pneumonectomy, and high-dose radiation which is designed to improve outcomes.
His additional research interests are based on numerous past projects relating to the multimodality management of malignant pleural mesothelioma, as well as innovative surgical techniques in minimally invasive thoracic surgery for lung cancer. He has led several major research studies, including clinical trials of neoadjuvant gemcitabine and cisplatin followed by extrapleural pneumonectomy and high dose radiation. He is the Principal Investigator of the Libby Epidemiology Research Program, funded by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR). The major goals of the research are to address questions regarding the health consequences of asbestos exposure (Libby Amphibole). After earning an undergraduate degree in biochemistry from New York University, he earned his M.D. at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and pursued his General Surgery Internship and General Surgery Residency at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center. He then completed a Thoracic Oncology Clinical Research Fellowship at Brigham and Women’s Hospital/Dana Faber Cancer Institute/CALGB in Boston, and his Cardiothoracic Surgery Residency at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School. He also received a Master in Biostatistics from Columbia University. He is a member of numerous medical and surgical societies and serves on several editorial boards.
Lilian Ferrer Lagunas, PhD
Lilian Ferrer Lagunas is Vice President for International Affairs at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. She is a UC midwife and earned a Master of Science in Nursing and a doctorate in Public Health from the University of Illinois, Chicago. A tenured professor at the School of Nursing, she worked for the last 15 years as director of International Affairs at that school. She has also been an adjunct professor at the University of Miami School of Nursing. Her areas of research and development have been mainly in the fields of public health, community sciences, HIV/AIDS prevention, global health, and social movements.
Richard J. Jackson, MD, MPH
Richard Jackson is Professor emeritus at the Fielding School of Public Health at the University of California, Los Angeles. A pediatrician, he served in many leadership positions with the California Health Department, including the highest as the State Health Officer. For nine years he was Director of the CDC’s National Center for Environmental Health and received the Presidential Distinguished Service award. He was also elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.
He was instrumental in establishing the California Birth Defects Monitoring Program and in the creation of state and national laws to reduce risks from pesticides, especially to farm workers and to children. While at CDC he established major environmental public health programs and instituted the federal effort to “biomonitor” chemical levels in the U.S. population. He received the Hero Award from the Breast Cancer Fund, Lifetime Achievement Awards from the Public Health Law Association and the New Partners for Smart Growth, the John Heinz Award for national leadership in the Environment, and the Sedgwick Medal, the highest award of the American Public Health Association. He also received the Henry Hope Reed Award for his contributions to the field of Architecture.
He lectures and speaks on many issues, particularly those related to built environment and health. He co-authored the books: Urban Sprawl and Public Health: Designing, Planning, and Building for Healthy Communities; Making Healthy Places: Designing and Building for Health, Well-being, and Sustainability; and Designing Healthy Communities for which he hosted a four-hour PBS series. He served on many environmental and health boards, as well as the Board of Directors of the American Institute of Architects. He is an elected honorary member of the American Society of Landscape Architects as well as the American Institute of Architects. His research interests include environmental impacts on health ranging from toxicology, chemical body burdens, terrorism, sustainability, climate change, urban design and architecture.
David A. Wirth, JD
David Wirth is Professor of Law at the Boston College Law School, where he served as Director of International Programs. He teaches primarily in the field of public international law, with a particular research interest in international environmental law–an area in which he worked and practiced for more than two decades. He also taught at Harvard, M.I.T., Oxford, the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, and the University of Virginia. Prior to moving to academia, he was Senior Attorney and Co-Director of the International Program at the Washington, D.C. office of the Natural Resources Defense Council, a nonprofit public interest law firm specializing in environmental issues. While there, he worked on a variety of international environmental issues, including environmental reform of World Bank and regional development banks, the “greenhouse” effect, Soviet and eastern European environmental issues, stratospheric ozone depletion, and exports of hazardous substances. He was Attorney-Adviser for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs in the Office of the Legal Adviser of the U.S. Department of State in Washington, D.C., where he had principal responsibility for all international environmental issues and he was engaged in multilateral negotiations under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Program, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the U.N. Economic Commission for Europe, among others.
He is a graduate of the Yale Law School and served as law clerk to Judge William H. Timbers of U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York. He holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in chemistry from, respectively, Princeton University and Harvard University, at which he held a National Science Foundation Fellowship. He was also a Fulbright Scholar through the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe Regional Research Program. He served as a consultant and on advisory boards of numerous institutions of higher learning, domestic agencies, and international organizations. A prolific writer, he is the author of more than fifty articles and reports. He is also co-author of major new editions of legal texts on international organizations and environmental law.
Nsedu Obot Witherspoon, MPH
Nsedu Obot Witherspoon serves at the Executive Director for the Children’s Environmental Health Network (CEHN), where her responsibilities include successfully organizing, leading, and managing policy, education/training, and science-related programs. For the past 18 years, she has served as a key spokesperson for children’s vulnerabilities and the need for their protection, conducting presentations and lectures across the country.
She is a leader in the field of children’s environmental health, serving as a member of the NIH Council of Councils, on the Science Advisory Board for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the External Science Board for the Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) NIH Research work. She is a Co-Leader for Advancing the Science/Health initiative of the National Collaborative on a Cancer-Free Economy. She is also a Board member for the Pesticide Action Network of North America, the Environmental Integrity Project, and serves on the Maryland Children’s Environmental Health Advisory Council.
She held past appointments on the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee for the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Board for the American Public Health Association. She is a past member of the National Association of Environmental Health Sciences Council and the Institute of Medicine’s Environmental Health Sciences Roundtable. One of CEHN’s leadership awards, the Nsedu Obot Witherspoon (NOW) Youth Leadership Award, was named in her honor. She is also the recent recipient of the William R. Reilly Award in Environmental Leadership from the Center for Environmental Policy at American University and the Snowy Egret Award from the Eastern Queens Alliance.
She earned a B.S. in Biology Pre-Med from Siena College and a M.P.H. in Maternal and Child Health from The George Washington University, School of Public Health and Health Services.
Elizabeth A. Williams, PhD, MDiv
At Tennessee State University, Elizabeth Williams is Interim Dean in the College of Public Service and Urban Affairs and Professor of Public Health in the Department of Public Health, Health Administration and Health Sciences. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Kentucky and an M.Div. from Vanderbilt University.
An applied medical anthropologist, Dr. Williams’ research expertise is in developing, implementing, and evaluating multi-level interventions to prevent and/or reduce cancer and other racial/ethnic health disparities. She participated in and initiated community-based participatory research (CBPR) and evaluation projects with community, public health, and academic partners; developed community partnerships in cancer disparities and other health efforts (including with media); and advised policy to support improved clinical care and public health access for underserved populations. With a professional background as a senior public health official, senior healthcare administrator in an academic medical center, licensed clergy, and academician, she worked on research and applied efforts across the country, notably in the southeast United States.
Noted for her work in eliminating cancer health disparities, cultural competence, and community-engaged research, she is the author of Black Women and Breast Cancer: A Cultural Theology (2019). With many scholarly papers, book chapters, and technical reports, she presented her work to national and international audiences.
Her research interests include social and behavioral sciences, cancer health disparities, cultural competence, community-engaged research, faith/spirituality and health.
Conor M. Kelly, PhD
Conor Kelly is an assistant professor in the department of theology at Marquette University in Milwaukee, WI. He regularly teaches medical ethics courses and writes about health care ethics from a theological perspective that is attentive to the influence of structural constraints on health, well-being, and moral agency. In 2021 he published the volume The Fullness of Free Time: A Theological Account of Leisure and Recreation in the Moral Life.
Christian Cintron, PhD
Christian Cintron received his Ph.D. in Theological Ethics from Loyola University Chicago in 2017. He currently serves as a clinical bioethicist at Anne Arundel Medical Center (Annapolis, MD), and adjunct lecturer in theology and ethics at Fairfield University (Fairfield, CT). Prior to his role at Anne Arundel Medical Center, he completed a fellowship with Trinity Health of New England where he directed three acute-care ethics committees and served on the ethics committee at Connecticut Children’s Hospital. His research and teaching include disparate experiences in end-of-life care, organizational approaches to clinical ethics issues, unconscious bias and discrimination in healthcare delivery, ageism and ‘good’ aging, and concepts of justice in healthcare.
Agnes Binagwaho, MD, M(Ped), PhD
Agnes Binagwaho is a Rwandan pediatrician who returned to Rwanda in July of 1996, two years after the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. Since then, she provided clinical care in the public sector, and served the Rwandan Health Sector in high-level government positions–first as the Executive Secretary of Rwanda’s National AIDS Control Commission, then as Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Health, and 5 years as Minister of Health.
She is the Vice-Chancellor of Rwanda’s University of Global Health Equity (UGHE), which she co-founded–an initiative of Partners in Health–and that aims at changing how healthcare is delivered around the world by training global health professionals who strive to deliver more equitable, quality health services for all.
She completed her M.D. at the Université Libre de Bruxelles and her M.A. in Pediatrics at the Université de Bretagne Occidentale. She is specialized in emergency pediatrics, neonatology, and the treatment of HIV/AIDS. She was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Science from Dartmouth College and earned a Ph.D. from the University of Rwanda College of Medicine.
She currently serves as a Senior Advisor to the Director General of the World Health Organization, and as a member of multiple Advisory Board and Board of Directors including the Rockefeller Foundation Board. She is a member of international working groups and task forces in global health for the United Nations and independent organizations, serves on the Editorial Board of several scientific journals and on multiple scientific commissions.
She co-chaired the Millennium Development Goal Project Task Force on HIV/AIDS and Access to Essential Medicines for the Secretary General of the United Nations under the leadership of Professor Jeffrey Sachs. She also co-chaired the Joint Learning Initiative on Children and HIV/AIDS (JLICA) and founded the Rwandan Pediatric Society, chairing it until 2019. Since 2016, she has been a member of the American National Academy of Medicine and since 2017 a Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences. In 2015, she received the annual Roux Prize and Ronald McDonald House Charities Award of Excellence.
She is currently a senior Lecturer in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School, Professor of Pediatrics at UGHE, and Adjunct Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine. Her academic engagements include research in implementation sciences, human rights to health, health services delivery systems, HIV/AIDS, and pediatric care. She has published over 190 peer-reviewed articles.
Rengaswamy Sankaranarayanan, MBBS
Rengaswamy Sankaranarayanan is senior medical advisor at RTI International, Delhi, India, where he is responsible for the overall strategy and functioning of health division, which involves carving out a road map for health practice in India. He earned a Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery, and is a trained clinical oncologist with over 40 years of experience in research, planning, implementing, and evaluating programs for cancer screening, control and information systems at the population level, in health systems, and in hospital contexts. He was recently appointed at the Advisory Board of the India-UK Cancer Research Initiative and is working as a Special Advisor on Cancer Control for the World Health Organization-International Agency for Research on Cancer (WHO-IARC) in Lyon, France. His expertise includes assessing cancer burden and patterns; planning, implementation, and evaluation of cancer screening programs, cancer control programs and cancer information systems; research, training, program development and technical assistance in the early detection and control of cancer (breast, colorectal, cervix, head, and neck); early detection and prevention of common cancers in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).
Walter Ricciardi, MD, MPH, MSc
Walter Ricciardi is President of the World Federation of Public Health Associations. He graduated in medicine and earned a doctorate in public health medicine from the University of Naples. He currently holds the title of Professor of Hygiene and Public Health at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Rome where he is also Director of the Department of Public Health and Deputy Head of the Faculty of Medicine.
In addition to contributing to over 300 academic papers, primarily in the fields of epidemiology, health services research and public health genomics, he is also editor of the European Journal of Public Health, the Oxford Handbook of Public Health Practice, and founding editor of the Italian Journal of Public Health. He was Chair of the Public Health Section of the Higher Health Council.
In 2011 the Minister of Health of Italy appointed him as his representative in the State-Region Committee for the evaluation of the Italian National Health Service. Internationally, he is a member of the European Commission expert panel on “Investing in Health,” a member of the U.S. National Board of Medical Examiners, and was elected President of the European Public Health Association (2010-2014).
Michail K. Shafir, MD
Michail Shafir is Clinical Professor of Surgery at the Ruttenberg Cancer Center and attending surgeon at The Mount Sinai Hospital, New York.
A graduate of the University of Chile and of the Surgery Residency program at Mount Sinai, he specializes in Surgical Oncology (for which he trained at the Gustave Roussy Cancer Institute in France). Former President of the New York Cancer Society and member of the Executive Council of the New York Surgical Society, he is also a member of major surgical and cancer societies, such as the American College of Surgeons and the Society of Surgical Oncology, as well as a core member of the Surgery Committee of the CALGB, a major national cooperative group for clinical trials in cancer.
Author of numerous scientific publications, his work has been presented at national and international conferences. His main clinical interests focus on surgery of breast tumors, malignant melanoma, and neuroendocrine tumors. He is fluent in French, Spanish, and Russian.
Bridgette Merriman
Bridgette Merriman is a second-year medical student at Boston University School of Medicine, pursuing her dream career of becoming a pediatric oncologist. At medical school, she leads several student organizations, including the Student Oncology Society; conducts research on the impact of COVID-19 on pregnant and parenting adolescents; and assists providers in the Teen and Tot clinic, caring for adolescent parents and their children. She graduated magna cum laude from Boston College in May 2020, with recognition from Phi Beta Kappa and Alpha Sigma Nu honor societies. She majored in Sociology and Biology, completed the Morrissey College of Arts and Sciences Honors Program, and earned Scholar of the College distinction for her sociology senior honors thesis titled, “The Impact of Childhood Cancer on Young Adult Survivors: A Lifecourse Perspective.” She also loves to stay active and is a kickboxing instructor in Brighton.
Woody Hubbell
Woody Hubbell graduated from Boston College in 2021, majoring in finance and entrepreneurship with a minor in history. In 2017, he was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia and began a three year treatment process at Boston’s Dana Farber Cancer Institute. Today, he lives in Minneapolis and works at Piper Sandler within their healthcare group.
Laura Campbell
Since 2008, Laura Campbell is lead waitstaff at Boston College Heights Catering. Married to Rick for 33 years, her daughter Emma graduated from Boston College in 2020. She lives in Salem, NH, and is a breast cancer survivor.
James F. Keenan, S.J., STD
At Boston College, James Keenan is Vice Provost for Global Engagement, Canisius Professor in the Theology Department, and Director of Jesuit Institute, and held the Gasson Chair and then the Founders Professorship in Theology. He earned his doctorate from the Gregorian University in Rome and taught at Fordham University and at the Weston Jesuit School of Theology. He authored and edited over a dozen of books, hundreds of articles and book chapters, and founded and directed the Moral Traditions Series of volumes in theological ethics published by Georgetown University Press.
Globally, he was the founder and co-chair of the network Catholic Theological Ethics in the World Church and contributed to organize regional and global conferences and two book series. Member of numerous boards, he was also consultor of the National Catholic Conference of Bishops for the Revision of the Ethical Guidelines for Catholic Health Care Institutions, the New York State Transplant Council, and was Group Leader of the Surgeon General’s Task Force on Responsible Sexual Conduct.
Silvia de Sanjosé, MD, PhD
Silvia de Sanjosé has over 30 years of expertise in epidemiology of human papilloma virus (HPV) and related cancers. She served as the President of the International Papilloma Virus Society (2015-2018) and has been Co-Chair of the Cape Town, Sydney, and Barcelona (virtual) conferences of the inactivated poliovirus vaccines (IPVs). She has experience in large international studies involving HPV worldwide genotyping and has been involved in the development of HPV-based screening guidelines for cervical cancer in Spain and in Catalonia. Previously, she worked at the International Agency for Research on Cancer, and at the Catalan Institute of Oncology. Currently, she is serving as Consultant for U.S National Cancer Institute and PATH. She leads teams working to evaluate the use of artificial intelligence applied to cervical images. She is also involved in studies providing insights on the association between HPV and HIV in cervical carcinogenesis applied to screening strategies. She is an affiliated professor at the Department of Epidemiology of the University of Washington in Seattle.
John Hardt, PhD
At the Stritch School of Medicine of Loyola University Chicago, John Hardt is Vice Dean for Professional Formation and Associate Professor of Bioethics at the Neiswanger Institute for Bioethics. His education includes and M.A. in Systematic Theology and a Ph.D. in Christian Ethics from Boston College.
Lecturer on issues pertaining to Catholicism and medicine, end-of-life decisions, and advanced directives, in 2012, he was awarded a two-year, funded appointment as a Faculty Scholar in The University of Chicago’s Program on Medicine and Religion where he pursued research at the intersection of the professional formation of physicians and Ignatian spirituality. As an outgrowth of his work as a Faculty Scholar, he serves as director of a new pilot project for medical student formation at Stritch entitled, The Program on the Physician’s Vocation. His research and writing focus on professional ethics, end-of-life care in the Catholic tradition, neonatal ethics, and physician conscience in the clinical encounter–a topic on which he offered testimony to the President's Council on Bioethics in Washington, D.C. His teaching portfolio considers issues in religion and medicine with special attention paid to the Catholic moral tradition.
Moderators
Thomas C. Chiles, PhD
Thomas Chiles is DeLuca Professor in Biology and Vice Provost for Research and Academic Planning and at Boston College. He received his B.S. in Microbiology and Cell Science from the University of Florida, and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Florida College of Medicine. He was also a post-doctoral fellow at Boston University School of Medicine in the Immunology/Oncology Training Program, as a Ruth L. Kirschstein NRSA fellow.
At Boston College, he served as Chair of the Biology Department. He also served on several National Institutes of Health study sections, including Hypersensitivity, Autoimmune and Immune-mediated Diseases and currently on the Cancer Biology special emphasis panel at the National Cancer Institute.
He was member of numerous editorial boards, including as Section Editor for the Journal of Immunology. He is a member of the American Association of Immunologists and American Society of Hematologists. He is currently serving on the editorial board of Frontiers in Immunology and served on the Commission on Pollution, Health and Development in partnership with the Lancet, the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution, and the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York.
Laura J. Steinberg, PhD
At Boston College, Laura Steinberg is the Seidner Family Executive Director of the Schiller Institute for Integrated Science and Society, and professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences. She holds a Ph.D. in Civil Engineering and was formerly dean of the College of Engineering and Computer Science at Syracuse University. She worked extensively on research in infrastructure management, disaster preparedness and response, engineering education, and environmental modeling. She served on the Environmental Protection Agency Science Advisory Board, Drinking Water Sub-Committee, and as an editor and advisory board member for the journals: Natural Hazards Review, Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, and the Journal of Environmental Engineering. For the American Society of Civil Engineers, she served three terms as a member of the Industry Leaders Council representing civil engineering faculty members throughout the U.S.
M. Cathleen Kaveny, JD, PhD
Cathleen Kaveny, a scholar who focuses on the relationship of law, religion, and morality, joined the Boston College faculty in 2014 as the Darald and Juliet Libby Professor, a position that includes appointments in both the department of theology and the law school. She is the first faculty member to hold such a joint appointment. A member of the Massachusetts Bar since 1993, she clerked for the Honorable John T. Noonan Jr. of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and worked as an associate at the Boston law firm of Ropes & Gray in its health law group.
She published four books and over a hundred articles and essays, in journals and books specializing in law, ethics, and medical ethics. She serves on the masthead of the magazine Commonweal as a regular columnist, and she is the chair of the board of trustees of the Journal of Religious Ethics as well as on several editorial boards. She has been the president of the Society of Christian Ethics.
She was a visiting professor at Princeton University, Yale University, and Georgetown University, and a visiting scholar at the University of Chicago’s Martin Marty Center. In Fall 2018 she was awarded the Cary and Ann Maguire Chair in Ethics and American History at the Kluge Center of the Library of Congress. Before joining Boston College, she taught law and theology at the University of Notre Dame, where she was John P. Murphy Foundation Professor of Law.
Danielle Sanchez, PhD
Danielle Sanchez is a Senior Scientist at AstraZeneca, where her work is focused on understanding mechanisms of tumor progression and therapy resistance in cancer. She earned a Ph.D. in Cell and Molecular Biology from the University of Pennsylvania in 2019, where her research investigated novel oncogenic pathways at the intersection of metabolism and gene regulation in kidney and bladder cancer. She graduated from Boston College in 2011 with a Bachelor of Science in Biology and a minor in Theology.
Daniel J. Daly, PhD
Between 2008 and 2019, Daniel Daly was associate professor of moral theology at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, NH. He earned a Ph.D. in Theological Ethics from Boston College. His research and publications fall into three categories. First, his current project develops a language for ethically scrutinizing global social structures to understand how social structures have a discernable moral character and to investigate how social structures facilitate or impede personal and social virtuous life.
Second, he is interested in questions in fundamental Catholic theological ethics, from happiness and the virtues to natural law and moral norms, from the ethics of Thomas Aquinas to the common good.
Third, by focusing on medical ethics and, particularly, on death and dying, he reflects on the Catholic tradition, and on clinical decision making in an age of extraordinary medical resources and deep inequalities in access.
He serves on the ethics boards of local hospitals. As a clinical medical ethicist, he assists in the adjudication of problematic cases that arise in these hospitals. In July 2019, he joined the School of Theology and Ministry at Boston College and, in 2021, he authored the volume The Structures of Virtue and Vice.
Ashley P. Duggan, PhD
Ashley Duggan is Professor in the Communication Department at Boston College where she teaches Health Communication, Research Methods, Relational Communication, and Nonverbal Communication. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her research is grounded in social sciences and addresses the intersections of nonverbal and verbal communication processes, health, and relationships. She holds additional appointments as adjunct faculty in Public Health and Community Medicine and in Family Medicine at Tufts University School of Medicine, where her connections allow for interdisciplinary research involving large-scale analysis of the development of reflective capacity in medicine, the ways reflective practice connects to communication processes in provider/patient interactions, and the ways communication predictors of health disparities vary across patient populations. In 2019 she authored the volume Health and Illness in Close Relationships: Advances in Personal Relationships.
Glenn R. Gaudette, PhD
Glenn Gaudette, a biomedical engineer who has pioneered the use of plants as scaffolding for heart regeneration, is the inaugural chair of Boston College’s new Engineering Department, which integrates the university’s liberal arts focus with a human-centered engineering curriculum to prepare students to find solutions that address critical human needs. His research, supported by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation, aims to develop a treatment for the millions of Americans suffering from myocardial infarction and other cardiovascular diseases. His work is also focused on the cultivation of protein products as sustainable food sources with reduced environmental impact.
Call for Posters
This Call for Posters invites undergraduate and graduate students at Boston College to submit a Poster for the conference on “The Rising Global Cancer Pandemic: Health, Ethics, and Social Justice” to be held at Boston College on Saturday, October 2, 2021 in the Heights Room, Corcoran Commons. This conference will be hosted jointly by the program in Global Public Health and the Common Good and the Theology Department.
Global public health is the science and art of promoting good health, preventing disease and extending longevity in countries around the world. Cancer is already the leading cause of death (ages 30-69 years of age) in most high-income countries and is the first or second leading cause of premature death in 134 countries. It is also the leading cause of death by disease in American children. The current global burden of an estimated 19.3 million new cancer cases in 2020 is expected to rise to 24 million new cases by 2035. The great majority of this increase will occur in low and medium-income countries.
The conference will bring together a distinguished group of scholars–from Boston College, across the United States, and internationally–in ethics, law, public policy, economics, global public health, and cancer prevention to examine some of the major ethical challenges facing global public health in the 21st century.
The Posters should present research or findings or reflections or artistic productions related to cancer, preferably in a global health perspective (e.g., by elucidating some of the social, political, economic and environmental factors that influence patterns of health and cancer, and drive disparities in health). Up to 30 posters will be selected. The selected posters will be displayed in the Boston Room and Newton Room adjacent to the Heights Room in Corcoran Commons where the conference will be held. To present the posters, two poster sessions are scheduled: during lunch (12:50 PM-1:30 PM) and during the final reception (6:10-7:00 PM).
Requirements for poster submission:
- Prepare the poster as a PDF.
- High resolution.
- PDF size should be close to 36" x 48".
- The deadline to submit the pdf of the poster is Monday, September 13, 2021 at 12:00 noon.
- Please send the pdf of your poster both to Kurt Straif (straif@bc.edu), Phil Landrigan (phil.landrigan@bc.edu), and Andrea Vicini, SJ (andrea.vicini@bc.edu).
- Actual printing of posters will be done off site; late submissions will not be accepted. The students who submitted the pdf of their posters will be notified of their acceptance or not by email on Friday, September 17, 2021, before 12:00 midnight.
- Accepted posters: The students are invited to record and submit to Andrea Vicini, SJ a short video presentation of their poster (1'-2' max). The students’ video presentations will be posted on the conference website.
- The accepted posters will be printed on foam board 36" x 48" and mounted on easels.
Thanks to the generosity of our benefactors, the organizing committee will pay for the printing of the accepted posters.
Poster Selection Committee
Joyce K. Edmonds, PhD, MPH, RN
Joyce Edmonds is associate professor at the Connell School of Nursing at Boston College. Her primary research concentration is in maternal health. She approached this topic from a public health perspective in the domestic and global context, exploring factors that influence maternal mortality and cesarean delivery rates. Themes of her research include women’s childbirth beliefs and health seeking behaviors; the influence of social and cultural factors on birth outcomes; and the influence of the nursing profession on interventions and outcomes in childbirth. She is currently investigating how to measure the influence of labor and delivery nurses on birth outcomes and the factors that shape their practice patterns. She supports physiologic labor and birth in childbearing women and aims at improving the quality and equity of maternity care services. She is an active member of Association of Women’s Health Obstetric and Neonatal Nursing (AWHONN) and Chair-Elect of the American Public Health Association Nursing Section.
Summer Sherburne Hawkins, PhD, MS
Associate Professor Summer Sherburne Hawkins joined the Boston College School of Social Work faculty in 2012. She is a social epidemiologist interested in addressing policy-relevant research questions in maternal and child health. Her research examines the impact of policies on health disparities in parents and children, particularly using methodology that integrates epidemiology and economics.
She published on the topics of parental and adolescent tobacco use, infant feeding practices, and childhood obesity as well as the impact of state and local policies on disparities in these health behaviors and outcomes. A more recent area of her research focuses on the role of the Affordable Care Act on the uptake of preventive health services. In January 2017, she received a 3-year grant from the American Cancer Society (ACA) titled: “Impact of the ACA on the prevention and early detection of women’s cancers.”
She is currently on the editorial board of the journal Maternal and Child Nutrition and an active member of the University Research Council at Boston College. Prior to joining the Boston College School of Social Work, she was a Cohort 7 Robert Wood Johnson Health & Society Scholar at the Harvard School of Public Health.
Campus Map and Parking
Parking is available at the nearby Beacon Street and Commonwealth Avenue Garages.
Boston College is also accessible via public transportation (MBTA B Line - Boston College).
Boston College strongly encourages conference participants to receive the COVID-19 vaccination before attending events on campus.
All videos recorded on October 02, 2021.