Global Health: Beyond the Figures

When drinking a nice cup of tea, have you ever asked yourself: where does this tea bag come from? In my talk, I will tell you some things you may not know about one the most refined teas of the world, Darjeeling tea. Produced at the foot of the Himalayas and targeted by organic and ethical trade certifications such as Fairtrade, Darjeeling tea is cultivated on plantations, and workers who pick its leaves are all women. What are the conditions of these women and their families? And do organic certifications actually improve their lives? Overall, can a product cultivated on a plantation ever be fair?

Every year, 13 million children are diagnosed with severe acute malnutrition. Clinicians give them the same therapeutic food, the same care, the same protocol. Yet some recover completely while others deteriorate and die. After eight years treating these children in Malawi, Geoffrey Manda came to London to ask why. He'll share how modern causal inference methods are helping us move beyond "does this treatment work on average?" to "which child needs what, and when?" bringing detective-level rigour to one of global health's oldest and most stubborn puzzles.