Personal interest and Academic or professional experience related to the project.
From October, 1994 to October, 1996, I served as a Disease Control Volunteer for the Peace Corps in Mauritania, West Africa. Like many volunteers, I joined the Peace Corps with idealistic hopes to "help the poor." The colossal obstacles we faced as volunteers quickly dashed superficial idealism: many volunteers quit and went home. However, I stayed because I understood that my Wolof family didn't need someone to feel sorry for them and solve their problems. They needed someone to care, and they needed someone to listen and work with them to solve their own problems.
My work spanned the disciplines of economics, history, politics, medical and cultural anthropology, agriculture, parasitic disease, public health, and engineering. The end of my Peace Corps service was marked by my contraction of schistosomiasis, the search for its origin in Mauritania, an effort to warn villagers about this new disease, and my quest to find a way to control it.
As a Peace Corps Volunteer, I lived for nearly two years in a village sandwiched between the Senegal River and the Sahara Desert. Suffering from mild starvation, loneliness and parasitic disease, I came to understand the tremendous inertia opposing the improvement of public health. In a land so desperately dependent on water, the water became our enemy, bearer of schistosomiasis. Because of a dam built for economic reasons, schistosomiasis has become hyperendemic in Mauritania where only fifteen years ago it did not exist. Salty village wells leave the villagers no choice but to collect their water from the river.
After my diagnosis and research into the disease, I began a campaign to educate my fellow villagers about it, but my efforts were reciprocated at best with the response, "What can we do about it?" I spoke with the regional health director, who raised his hands in a gesture of defeat. I met with an official of the World Health Organization, who informed me that hematuria was a sign of maturity in his own country.
I was the sole health volunteer in my region of Mauritania, and Peace Corps, for their own reasons, had no plans to place future health volunteers in my region. Outgunned as a single volunteer with few resources, I arranged treatment for my village family, educated my fellow volunteers and an incoming group of trainees, and returned upon completion of my service to the U.S.
I eventually settled in to study parasitology at Tulane. My training there has given me a broad education in parasitic disease, including lymphatic filariasis. This specific education includes laboratory identification of Wuchereria bancrofti and its differentiation from other microfilaria, identification and control of its mosquito vectors including Culex quinquefasciatus, and the immunopathology of the disease as well as its treatment.
It is my understanding that the prevalence of lymphatic filariasis is associated with contaminated water in urbanized areas, providing optimal breeding grounds for the Culex vector species. Without appropriate control measures, this problem will continue to increase with the expansion of urbanization in the developing world.
I learned in January of the generous donation of albendazole by SmithKline Beecham in an effort to eradicate lymphatic filariasis. With sponsorship such as this, I envision that with the proper education, political support, and wide availability of treatment, lymphatic filariasis can be a candidate for eradication. I would be thrilled to take part in this concerted effort to eliminate a parasitic disease.
Personal Career Goals
Given my experience and academic training, I understand that public health depends upon the interaction of economics, politics, and culture with the etiologic agents of disease. In order to preserve their cultures and thrive, men and women of the developing world must have access to better health care, education, and nutrition. Effective public health measures will simultaneously address all of these subjects.
Through work and continuing education, I plan to continually build upon my knowledge of these subjects. I expect that by working for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, I will enhance and build upon my arsenal of skills through experience and by sharing ideas with seasoned professionals who share my interests. As I mature into an accomplished public health practitioner, I expect to gain more responsibility and autonomy to implement projects related to the improvement of public health. Eventually, I hope to teach from personal experience, and to influence policy to improve implementation of public health programs.
Specific Skills I will bring to the fellowship.
Academic training in health education and public health
Before my Peace Corps service began, I received three months of training in health education. This training included techniques of health education for villagers, doctors, and public officials. Our training was based on the use of proven and creative methods to convey sound health ideas. It included animations, preparation of effective visual aids, and the use of native language and cultures to ensure the greatest appeal to Mauritanians.
My education in Parasitology at Tulane has given me a rigorous understanding of the scientific basis for parasitic and other disease. It has also supplemented my previous training and experience in health education, specifically medical anthropology and program management.
Prior experience in communicating scientific information for the purposes of program development and training
As a result of my interest in schistosomiasis, I initiated the first serious study of the disease by Peace Corps in Mauritania. I was subsequently asked by the Peace Corps Bureau to train new volunteers about the disease, specifically to enable them to:
avoid infecting themselves;
- assess potential risk of its presence in their work regions;
- educate villagers as to the causes of disease;
- work with regional health authorities to encourage the funding of treatment programs;
- consider the potential methods to control its transmission.
Additionally, I compiled my information into a report to be used as a reference to train future volunteers.
Good written and oral communication skills
As a volunteer, my potential to do good work hinged on my ability to bring understanding to uneducated villagers and powerful bureaucrats alike. My experience with them taught me to modify the information I present to make it relevant and interesting to the audience.
In recognition of my speaking abilities, I was honored to represent volunteers at the Peace Corps 25th Anniversary celebration in Mauritania. I presented a speech in the African language of Wolof, and my participation allowed me to subsequently meet the President of Mauritania.
While at Tulane, my fellow classmates have noticed this ability and have chosen me to present group information in our courses.
Other skills
I also possess a strong, natural aptitude for computers. I have used this skill to install complex information systems and train others to use these systems to their potential. I foresee this skill to be of definite benefit in an ambitious project spanning different agencies, countries and cultures.
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