Scientia series starts with Tarlov’s Oct. 9 talk

Scientia
series starts with Tarlov’s Oct. 9 talk
…………………………………………………………………

BY DANA BENSON
Rice News Staff

Alvin Tarlov,
a senior fellow at Rice’s James A. Baker III Institute
for Public Policy, will commence the 2001-2002 Scientia
Colloquia with a talk on “The Social Determinants of
Population Health and Human Welfare Policies.”

His talk is
set for Oct. 9 at 4 p.m. in the Kyle Morrow Room of Fondren
Library.
The topic of this year’s Scientia Colloquia is “Health
and Welfare Policy.” According to the program synopsis,
the series of talks will address threats to human welfare
that were introduced during the last century, including
environmental hazards, weapons of mass destruction and infectious
diseases such as AIDS. These threats came about even though
the last century brought enormous progress in living standards,
with economic prosperity and medical and technological research
combining to increase longevity and quality of life for
many.

“The result
is that while the potential for expanding the duration and
quality of life to new heights has never been greater, so
too the potential for the rapid elimination of our species
has never loomed so large,” the synopsis states. “What
are the prospects for human health and welfare as we move
into the new century? How will the race between the development
of new preventive measures and cures, on the one hand, and
new hazards on the other, resolve itself?”

Those are some
of the issues the series of Scientia speakers will address.
Lecturers in the series include former U.S. Surgeon General
C. Everett Koop, who will deliver the Bochner Lecture, titled
“The Right to Health Care: Has the Time Come?,”
Nov. 16 at 8 p.m., and Baruch Brody, Rice professor of philosophy,
who will speak on “Philosophical Reflections on the
Stem-Cell Research Debate” Dec. 4 at 4 p.m.

To start the
colloquia, Tarlov will discuss health and welfare in the
United States. In the abstract of his talk, Tarlov states,
“The health of Americans is substandard relative to
the peoples’ of other economically developed nations.
Of the various factors that influence population health,
social and societal characteristics have evolved in the
20th century to become the most influential.”

His presentation
about Americans’ health will include:

• The U.S.
paradox of highest health care expenditures per capita while
health ranks in the lowest quartile;
• The paradox of a steadily rising life expectancy
yet widening disparities in health; those at the top of
the socioeconomic ladder have superior health, with each
step down the ladder revealing lower health status;
• The science base of this young field, which supports
a summary declaration that inequality in social and societal
advantage is the fundamental driving force that creates
disparities in health; and
• Recent evidence of the real-life practical implications
of social inequality.

“What can
be done in the short term and what needs to be accomplished
in the long term to transform America’s social organization
toward improved health and welfare?” Tarlov poses in
his abstract. “With the information revolution in a
world moving toward a universal economy, there is almost
instant capacity to see and hear almost everyone else in
the world. More flexible policies regarding the tradeoffs
between individualistic libertarianism and the collective
public good might be needed to address issues of health
and welfare.”

Scientia is
an institute of Rice University faculty founded in 1981
by the mathematician and historian of science Salomon Bochner.
Scientia provides an opportunity for scholarly discussion
across disciplinary boundaries; its members and fellows
come from a wide range of academic disciplines.

Scientia talks
are held in Fondren Library’s Kyle Morrow Room, except
for the Bochner Lecture, which will be held in McMurtry
Auditorium, Anne and Charles Duncan Hall.