The Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya participated in the just completed 6th Asia Pacific Conference on Public Health (APCPH), which was held at the Equitorial Hotel in Penang from the 22-25 July 2019. The faculty members, staff and students from the Department attended the conference as speakers, oral and poster presenters and exhibitors. This is the first time the Department set-up an exhibition booth at a conference. The aim of the booth was to promote Public Health@UM, our research centres; Centre for Epidemiology & Evidence-Based Practice (CEEBP) and Centre of Population Health (CePH), our postgraduate programmes and also to connect with our alumni. Prof Moy Foong Ming and Ms Nor Fadhlina Othman was also at the conference to manage the Public Health@UM booth.

The APCPH is a biannual event organised by the College of Public Health Medicine, Academy of Medicine Malaysia (CPHM-AMM). The aim of the conferences was to promote Public Health practice and research in the Asia Pacific regions. It provides a platform for practitioners in Malaysia to connect with local and regional Public Health practitioners and experts. This year the 6th APCPH was co-organised by the Malaysian Armed Forces Health Services and the Penang State Health Department. The theme for the 6th APCPH was Urbanisation Challenges for Health. Prof Victor Hoe was the Chair of the Conference and Prof Sanjay Rampal was the Scientific Chair.

The keynote address was delivered by the Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah the Director General of Health. In addition, there were 6 pre-conference workshops, 3 plenaries and 12 symposium sessions, and 76 oral and 205 poster free papers during the conference. Over 1,000 people attended the conference.

Dr Jason Vivek, one of our Master of Public Health candidate, and Dr Amirah Azzeri and Dr Nadrah Arfizah Arifin our Doctor of Public Health candidates, won three of the eight best oral presentations. Dr Jason presented his MPH research project titled “Forecasting Hand, Foot and Mouth Diseases using weather variables and Google search queries in Sabah, Malaysia”, Dr Amirah Azzeri her DrPH project titled “Household Health-Related Expenditure and Poverty Impact on Chronic Hepatitis C Disease – Evidence from Malaysia” and Dr Nadrah her DrPH project titled “Geospatial Assessment of Food Outlets and Facilities for Physical Activities as Components of Obesogenic Environment Surrounding Malaysian Adolescents”. Dr Rosidah Omar our DrPH candidate won one of the 12 best posters with her presentation titled “Effectiveness of Influenza Vaccination on Absenteeism of Health Care Workers in Tertiary Hospital in Perak, Malaysia.

We were able to connect with many of our Alumni from the 90’s up to today.