VanderWeele TJ. Moral controversies and academic public health: Notes on navigating and surviving academic freedom challenges.
GLOBAL EPIDEMIOLOGY 2023;
6:100119. [PMID:
38111523 PMCID:
PMC10726229 DOI:
10.1016/j.gloepi.2023.100119]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/14/2023] [Accepted: 08/14/2023] [Indexed: 12/20/2023] Open
Abstract
Schools of public health often serve both as public health advocacy organizations and as academic units within a university. These two roles, however, can sometimes come into conflict. I experienced this conflict directly at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health in holding and expressing unpopular minority viewpoints on certain moral controversies. In this essay I describe my experiences and their relation to questions of academic freedom, population health promotion, and efforts at working together across differing moral systems.
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