University of Brighton

Global Health PGDip

The importance of global health has never been more apparent. Our course focuses on understanding current global health issues, their complex determinants and potential solutions to various global health problems. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are swiftly adapting to necessary changes and maximising opportunities for enhancing learning on our Global Health MSc. As a Global Health team, our priority is the safety and well-being of our students and staff.

The Global Health MSc will be taught online for the academic year 2020-21, using a blend of live, synchronous teaching, and pre-recorded/asynchronous materials. Our timetables, teaching methods and course content will all be adapted to make the most of this approach.

During the Spring term of 2021, students will have the opportunity to choose two from a range of optional modules. Some of the optional modules that we normally make available to our students are delivered by the University of Sussex and IDS, and depending on their decisions for provision it may or may not be possible to study these modules entirely online. We are committed to ensuring that all our students have a choice of optional modules which they can complete remotely.

During the Spring term, we are offering 3 modules that can be taken on a stand-alone basis. These are: Access to Medicine; Communicable Disease; and Conflict, Violence and Health module. These modules can be taken either informally for Continuing Professional Development only, or with the option to complete a formal assessment and gain Masters’ level credits. (It may be possible to use these credits on the MSc Global Health course or another postgraduate course at a later date).

The health and wellbeing of people differs widely across the globe. Life expectancy varies from 45 years in some countries to double that figure in others, and similar inequalities exist within countries. 

Many complex factors and processes simultaneously operating from the local to the global spheres affect the health of individuals, populations and nations. As these factors change, so do the challenges and opportunities for improving health locally and globally. The global health programme at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Global Health Research develops students’ understanding of the complex determinants of health and their potential solutions in order to help them contribute to the improvement of health and the achievement of health equity and social justice worldwide. With this purpose, this programme offers an inter-multi and cross-disciplinary approach to health and ill-health. 

The course brings together experts from the health sciences, pharmaceutical sciences, development studies, anthropology, economics and political sciences among others in order to deliver a stimulating and vibrant programme. We combine traditional didactic teaching with dynamic and interactive methods, using case studies alongside evidence and insights from the various disciplines to facilitate students’ critical understanding of current global health issues, their complex determinants and their potential solutions.