The second part of the Johns Hopkins Center for Humanitarian Health (CHH)-Lancet Commission webinar series took place on the 15th of April 2025. The webinar explored the implications of the current geopolitical shifts on the training and education of humanitarian professionals. The panellists characterised the diverging notion of decoloniality in their settings and explored promising and practical initiatives.

Among other themes, the discussion covered questions of the U.S. centricity in this discussion, misconceptions on what decolonizing is, the role of equitable partnerships, calls for governments in affected settings to step up and the idea of political will, and the importance of decolonizing the system’s collective thought.

Moderator:
Chi-Chi Undie – Research Director, Baobab Research Programme Consortium, Population Council; Co-Chair, CHH-Lancet Commission, Kenya

Speakers:
🎙 Sabina Faiz Rashid – Professor, Mushtaque Chowdhury Chair in Health and Poverty, and Director, Center of Excellence for Gender, Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, BRAC James P Grant School of Public Health, BRAC University; Commissioner, CHH- Lancet Commission, Bangladesh
🎙 Nicolas MEDA – Professor, Department of Public Health, Health Sciences and Training Unit, and Director, Higher Institute of Population Sciences, Joseph Ki-Zerbo University; Commissioner, CHH- Lancet Commission Burkina Faso
🎙 Awsan Bahattab – Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Center for Research and Training in Disaster Medicine, Humanitarian Aid and Global Health; NextGen scholar, CHH-Lancet Commission, Italy
🎙 Almarat Omar – Hub Manager, University of Geneva InZone Program, Kakuma, Kenya

Watch the webinar recording

The webinar series will continue in autumn 2025, addressing important and challenging issues that face the humanitarian community. These events attempt to facilitate timely discussions and help the Commission to consider and take into account the perspectives of interested colleagues from around the world. Follow the Commission’s social media channels to stay informed about upcoming webinars.