For students attending the Erasmus Mundus Master Programme in Public Health in Disasters Programme outline (EMMPHID)
The Erasmus Mundus Master Course in Public Health in Disasters (EMMPHID) is a joint university educational programme organised by the Emergency and Disaster Research Unit of the Universidad de Oviedo (Spain), the Department of Global Public Health at Karolinska Institutet (Sweden) and the Department of Primary Care and Population Health of the University of Nicosia (Cyprus)
Presentation
Disasters cause damage, suffering and death and leave people in need of life-saving assistance A disaster disrupts the functioning of a society, leading to human, material, economic and environmental losses that overwhelm local capacity and necessitate national or international response [UNDRR].
Disasters are caused by hazards, but whether a situation will develop into a disaster or not depends on several factors, related to: one hand vulnerability, on the other hand: coping capacity and resilience. Throughout the history of mankind, we have been accompanied by disasters. While we may think of epidemics, floods, earthquakes and wars as unusual or rare events, they are in fact common and affect more than 200 million people every year.
Disasters do not only cause caseloads of new injured and sick but also disrupt the health system and its capacity to deal with preventive programmes and common conditions already present before the disaster. A public health approach is fundamental in assessing and addressing any disaster situation. The Master program; Public Health in Disasters, is a multi-disciplinary program that focuses on causes, risk factors and impacts, reducing risks, responding to and recovering from disasters, from a public health perspective.
The aim of the master programme is to, through knowledge, experience and research build capacities that will reduce disaster risks and contribute to better and more targeted public health based response following disasters.
Anneli Eriksson Research Specialist Ph.D
Programme Director
Content
The program starts with core courses, of a total of 40 ECTs, where disaster concepts, risk analysis and risk reduction as well as general principles for disaster response and disaster response systems are covered.
The students then move to one of the two tracks available.
The KI are part of one track, that focus on public health response in disasters, which is also the name of the first course at KI. The course gives 20 ECTs.
The next course: Applied research methods in disaster comprise 10 ECTs.
After this course the student will do an internship of 20 ECTs, under the coordination of the Oviedo university and then finalise their master with a Master Thesis course of 30 ECTs, either at KI or at Oviedo university.
Syllabus
The syllabus is the programme's governing document and contains the overall learning objectives for the program, content and structure.
Syllabus Erasmus Mundus Master Programme in Public Health in Disasters, 120 credits
Programme outline and course overview
Courses
The links below lead to course websites for the current course version, with schedules, syllabuses and literature lists.
Global Health and Disaster (5HD003) 7.5 credits
Dates: 2025-01-20 - 2025-02-23
Public Health Response in Health Crisis and Disasters (5HD004) 15 credits
Dates: 2025-02-24 - 2025-05-04
Qualitative Research and Evaluation Methods in Disasters (5HD005) 7.5 credits
Dates: 2025-05-05 - 2025-06-08
Academic calendar
Academic calender for undergraduate and advanced level education at Karolinska institutet.