Podcast Series 2021: Get Global – Global Health Talks

In this episode, we welcome SDG Advocate and community development practitioner, Niamh Flynn and Niamh Hennessy, an engineer, and practicing meditation and Yoga teacher. They speak to us about their recently launched project: SDG Meditate, a meditation podcast series which gives listeners the chance to re-energise while considering each of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) both as an individual and as part of the collective global community. The aim of the podcast is to bring the SDG goals into the lives of listeners in way that is beneficial for health and happiness. In a lively and informative chat, they talk about what it means to be connected and how they hope to inspire and empower others to help make the SDGs happen.

In this episode, pharmacist and motivational speaker Jack Kavanagh speaks to us about diversability. He shares how he responded to being cast off his path at just 20 years of age after a serious injury and what motivates him to inspire others. He talks about a proactive approach to health and “healing in the absence of cure”, applying his own version of ‘magic’ to motivate others.

In this episode, we speak to Colin Roche, the programme coordinator for Climate Justice and Energy at Friends of the Earth Europe. Colin has worked for over 20 years in global justice campaigning, previously working for Oxfam in Ireland and internationally, and with other campaign groups on trade, finance, corporate justice, climate and other issues. He discusses the early influences that inspired him to become a climate justice activist from school Concern debates, to currently working on the EU Green Deal. He emphasizes how climate change affects all aspects of our lives, across the whole globe, with heavier impacts in the global South. He also shares his experience of working to stop oil pollution in Nigeria.

Diarmuid O’Donovan is Professor of Global Health at Queen’s University Belfast and honorary consultant in public health at the Public Health Agency in Northern Ireland. In this podcast, he carries us through his journey from a 24-hour fast for Concern in secondary school, to studying medicine, to working in Zambia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. His work has included clinical, research, education and policy aspects of HIV, maternal and child health, and research capacity building. He talks about equality, equity and justice and what the growing language surrounding the decolonisation of global health means and how it will be achieved.

In this episode, we speak to Nicola Brennan, Ireland’s Ambassador to Ethiopia, South Sudan and Djibouti, currently based in Ethiopia. She shares candidly her journey from her first development position in Indonesia to her current role as Ireland’s Ambassador. She talks about the policy priorities of the Irish government, how gender equality is firmly embedded in her team at the Embassy, what it is like to be a woman leader and her hopes for the future.

Majo Rivas is a Paraguayan-Irish activist who has worked in sexual and reproductive rights, migrant rights and disability rights. In this episode she shares a very personal perspective on the issue of vaccine inequity and barriers to access to medicines. With almost all of her immediate family in Paraguay, the COVID-19 vaccine inequity is particularly close to home. She describes the situation in Paraguay in terms of the health system, and how it was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. She also explains what the TRIPS waiver is and how it can facilitate equitable access to vaccines worldwide.

In this episode, professor Anne Matthews is sharing her experience of working in the global health field, from studying and teaching as a nurse and midwife, to living and working in Malawi and becoming the chair of the Irish Global Health Network’s board. She discusses her current research on infant feeding policy and implementation in Malawi and her work as a coordinator of the BSc. in Health & Society programme in Dublin City University. Finally, she shares her advice for early career professionals and young people wanting to get involved in global health.

In this episode, Dr. Ciara Conlan, Co-founder of Access to Medicines Ireland, discusses with IGHN’s Nadine Ferris France her decision to study medicine, her early career and how Access to Medicines Ireland came about. She also discusses intellectual property law and patent rights in the context of Covid-19 vaccine production and vaccine equity.

In this episode, Robbie Lawlor, HIV Activist and founding member of Access to Medicines Ireland, describes his path into working on HIV projects overseas and in Ireland.

Robbie discusses issues like HIV and stigma; intellectual property rights and patents in relation to HIV treatments; and the urgency on Big Pharma to adopt measures to roll out the tech and know-how in helping to open up COVID-19 vaccine production worldwide.

In this episode, General Practitioner Dr Brendan O’Shea talks all things global health with Nadine Ferris France of the Irish Global Health Network.

Listen to an Irish GP’s perspective: how he got involved in global health; details on specific projects and importantly his advice to younger generations aspiring to a future in global health.

Brendan O’Shea is a GP Family Doctor & Adjunct Professor in Trinity College Dublin.