Date of Award

January 2021

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Public Health (MPH)

Department

School of Public Health

First Advisor

Kaveh Khoshnood

Abstract

AbstractIntroduction. The ethical challenges faced by public health practitioners responding to COVID-19 pandemic have highlighted the importance of establishing public health ethics (PHE) education in schools of public health. The objective of this study was to investigate the status of PHE education in Chinese schools of public health and the attitudes of public health students toward PHE education. Methods. A mixed-method study was conducted to collect qualitative and quantitative data. Questionnaires and semi-structured interviews with undergraduate and graduate/doctoral students from five leading schools of public health in China, were used to collect information on ethical education in these schools and public health students' attitudes toward PHE education. Results. All five of China's leading public health schools and programs offer ethics-related education for both undergraduate and graduate/Ph.D. students. Only Peking University's School of Public Health offers an independent PHE course, while Central South University’s PHE course is on schedule. Most common topics in the ethics courses in these five schools include ethical foundations, concepts and methods of medical ethics, and research ethics. 70 public health students self-rated their knowledge of 13 PHE topics with a mean score of 3.32/5.00 and scored the necessity for teaching 13 PHE topics with a mean score of 4.00/5.00. Conclusions. Chinese Schools of Public Health should make public health ethics education an important pillar for improving the educational system. Keywords. China, School of Public Health, Public Health Ethics, Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases

Comments

This thesis is restricted to Yale network users only. This thesis is permanently embargoed from public release.

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