Conferences
15–17 May 2019, Detroit
The 8th Annual Meeting of inVIVO Planetary Health, “From Challenges, to Opportunities”
Our 8th annual conference is in one of the most dynamic cities in the world! The theme, “From Challenges, to Opportunities”, underscores the imperative to address the complex ecological challenges of advancing global urbanization—for personal, environmental, economic and societal health alike. Our agenda continues to address strategies to overcome global ‘dysbiotic drift’ (life in distress) on every level.
Detroit—a rejuvenated city, transformed after social and economic devastation—provides the perfect backdrop for these discussions, using case studies from inspirational local efforts to restore hope, purpose, and reduce health and social disparities through community youth activities, free inner city food farms, and sensory gardens for children to play.
This continues to reflect our focus on understanding and improving the complex relationships between human health and planetary health. We seek to emphasize the eco-biological interactions in our living environment (including urbanization, food systems, education, social inequity, climate change, biodiversity loss, and microbial ecology) on physical, mental and spiritual well-being, together with the wider community and societal factors that govern these. We continue to do this with a strong developmental ‘life-course’ approach that recognizes the critical need for long range vision and disease prevention.
We are very proud of our tremendous network of like-minded people from diverse fields and many regions who collaborate to address these modern health challenges and, importantly, how they link to wider global challenges. Our interests span from planetary/population/ environmental health to microbial ecology/ systems biology and the deep biological mechanisms—basically working ‘symbiotically’ to connecting the siloes through an integrated systems framework.
Our meetings are always highly interactive with as much emphasis on meaningful collaborations and productive friendships as on the data and opportunities we generate. It is our privilege and pleasure to welcome you to Detroit!
Prof Susan Prescott (Network Director)
Prof Ganesa Wegienka (Meeting Chair and Co-Director)
Brian Smith (Local Organiser)
Prof Dianne Campbell (Network Co-Director)
