A Perfect Intersection

By Nicole Savage
Global health major

I sat in the corner of a brightly lit conference room with a spiral bound notebook in my hand. In the center of the room was a large oval-shaped table, with nearly twenty people sitting in a semicircle facing three panelists. There were name tags on the table, each with a different African country listed on it – Togo, Mali, Senegal, Cameroon, Mozambique, South Africa. This meeting was part of the IVLP, or the International Visitor Leadership Program, hosted by the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. If the group of visitors is somehow relevant to global health, my office, the Office of Global Health Diplomacy, will often participate or even co-host these presentations. This week, the visitors were healthcare professionals from various countries around the world – community health workers, hospital managers, individuals working in their Ministry of Health – mostly from countries in Africa but with one woman from Haiti. Their two-week trip to the US included a visit to CDC in Atlanta, NIH in Bethesda, USAID, and finally the State Department. The three panelists from State were the policy consultant from my office, a woman from the Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator, and a man from the Policy and Economics office of the Africa bureau. The visitors were here to learn about global health diplomacy and about the PEPFAR programs in many of their countries.

For two hours, I sat in the conference room listening to conversations about the US government’s involvement in global health in each of the visitors’ countries. Various technical terms were thrown around related to biodefense, PEPFAR programming, health systems strengthening, the International Health Regulations, the Global Health Security Agenda, and so on. The representative from my office talked about his time as a PEPFAR coordinator in Nairobi, Kenya and emphasized the importance of diplomacy when it comes to making global health a priority in the agendas of foreign governments. He talked about engaging with Ministers of Health and heads of state and using health as a tool for international cooperation. Halfway through the meeting, the conversation suddenly switched into French. Half of the participants did not speak English and had been listening to a translator repeating the panelists’ words in French through little earpieces. One of the visitors, a young AIDS specialist from Mauritania, had asked a question in French, and the panelist from the Africa bureau, who had worked on the ground in Mali for three years, responded to his question in the same language. For the next fifteen minutes, the panelists, translator, and participants went back and forth in a mix of French and English.

As I sat in this room, listening to discussions about policy and diplomacy in the context of global health, while hearing French and not relying on the translator to understand what was being said, I realized that this is exactly the type of work I had in mind when I first came to Duke. I realized that all my afternoons in the Sanford commons and Trent Hall, all my hours sitting in class, all the time I spent studying and choosing my schedule and meeting with my advisor to pick my majors, had led up to this very moment – the perfect intersection of all my education. As a Public Policy and Global Health double major and a French minor, I knew that there would be some type of job that would allow me to draw upon my skills and interests in one setting, but that it would be hard to find. And yet there I was, on the first floor of the State Department building, surrounded by health and policy experts from Africa and Haiti, actually witnessing the intersection of my majors and minor. This moment was so exciting and rewarding to me. After the meeting, I spoke with some of the visitors in French, introducing myself to the woman from Haiti and explaining, in my extremely broken Haitian Creole, that I had traveled to Leogane to do mental health research last summer. She was delighted to hear that I had been to Haiti and that I enjoyed my time there, and encouraged me to come back as soon as I can.

These IVLP meetings are just one example of some of the exciting hands-on work I’ve been able to do at my internship this summer. I have attended many of the courses that my office teaches at the Foreign Service Institute, joining foreign service officers as they learn about global health diplomacy and US government involvement in health programs around the world before they are sent off to their posts. I’ve spent the past three days at the Institute, taking a course on Global Health Diplomacy organized my office and the Office of International Health and Biodefense. In this course, I’ve had the opportunity to listen and participate in talks with scientists, doctors, policymakers, and researchers in some of the highest offices at government agencies like USAID, HHS, and DoD; nonprofits like the UN Foundation and PATH; and other institutions such as the National Security Council and the Georgetown School of Public Health. In just three days, I feel like I’ve learned almost as much as I would learn in an entire semester of class!

Last week, I joined the Acting Special Representative of my office, along with representatives from HHS, CDC, USAID, PEPFAR, Peace Corps, and Department of Defense in a briefing for the Ambassador designate to Rwanda, the day before her testimony in front of Congress. The presenters updated the future Ambassador on existing health issues in the country, USG health programs that are in place there, and obstacles that may hinder her ability to negotiate with the leadership in the country. Later this week, I’ll be attending a briefing with the Ambassador to Jordan, as well as a briefing with the CDC Director in the Dominican Republic.

Perhaps the most rewarding aspect of my job this summer is my ability to see how exactly all the research I have been doing is translated into real action – whether the powerpoint slides I created are being used in the FSI course, or the briefing I prepared is being given to an Ambassador who may someday use that information to engage in diplomatic relations with a Head of State or a Minister of Health. It’s very encouraging to know that all the time I spend doing research or preparing documents is actually valued and worthwhile. And it’s even more exciting to realize how much I am learning along the way!

It’s hard to believe my time at State is starting to come to a close. In less than two weeks I will be missing work to volunteer at the US-Africa Leaders Summit taking place at the State Department. After that, I’ll have only one week left! I’m looking forward to the rest of my time here!

See my last post: Institutionalizing Health Diplomacy
This was originally posted on Sanford's blog Policy Meets World.