Recently, the Global Health Institute (GHI) was formally established in Xi’an Jiaotong University,one of the top universities in China and the leading university in West China. Alarge number of international and national leading experts, local scholars and students attended the Sep 18 GHI Inaugural Meeting and the 2016 Xi’an GlobalHealthForum,held in the InternationalConference Hall of Qujiang Hotel, Xi’an, China.

Vice-President of Xi'an Jiaotong University, Hong Yan hosted the meeting

This historical initiative is expected to bring together many of the top minds in China and worldwide to explore, embrace and address the challenges that affect people’s health across the globe, to take advantage of the emerging opportunities in China and globally, to advance transdisciplinary research and eduation, and support international collaboration.

President of Xi'an Jiaotong University, Shuguo Wang, the Former President of Chinese Academy of Medicine and academician, Denian Ba, President of the China Medical Board (CMB), Lincoln Chen,Vice-President of Xi’an Jiaotong University Guang Xi, Hong Yan and Founding Director of the GHI, Youfa Wang attended the unveiling ceremony.

A number of international and national leaders in the health field and key officials from related government agencies in China and international organizations including several academicians participated in the ceremony and forum and delivered speeches. These include the Former President of Chinese Academy of Medicine and academician, Denian Ba, former Vice Minister of Ministry of Health, President of the Chinese Preventive Medicine and academician Longde Wang, the Vice President of Chinese Academy of Engineering and academician, Daiming Fan, Director of the Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology and academician Jianguo Xu, President of the China Medical Board (CMB) and Professor at Harvard University, Lincoln Chen, Deputy Director of International Cooperation Department of the National Health and Family Planning Commission Yong Feng, Deputy Director of Family Planning Commission of Shaanxi Province Zhenlin Sun, Director of China National Centerfor Biotechnology Development Deping Wang, United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) Director, Suying Chang, and President of Xi’an Jiaotong University Shuguo Wang ,Vice-Presidentof Xi’an Jiaotong University Guang Xi, Mingzhe Rong, HongYan and Tiejun Wang.

Former President of Chinese Academy of Medicine and academician, Denian Ba

President of the Chinese Preventive Medicine and academician, Longde Wang

“This new world-class institute will be unique in a number of ways. While the biomedical disciplineswill serve as the foundation of the GHI, affiliated researchers will come from a set of different disciplines like mathematics, statistics, engineering, informationsciences, as well as social sciences,”The GHI Founding Director, Dr. Youfa Wang says, “The institute will become a hub to help form and exchange new ideas and support interdisciplinary research and collaboration across the globe. The research and training projects to be conducted by the institute will adopta transdisciplinary approach that brings expertise across the landscape of sciences. GHI will benefit from and serve China’s key national development strategies, including ‘the Beltand Road’,and focus on addressing key health-related problems and solutions in China and globally.”

The GHI Founding Director, Youfa Wang

The GHI was established aiming to help achieve key national development strategies including China’s “National Innovation-driven Development Strategy” and “The Belt and RoadInitiatives”. Responding to these key national strategies, in 2015 Xi’an Jiaotong University started to construct the “China West Scientific and Technological Innovation Harbour”, which was jointly funded by the Chinese Ministry of Education and Shaanxi Province. As one of the key components of this Harbour, the new GHI aims to help improve the health of people in China, “the Belt and Road”countries and around the world, promote global health research, foster interdisciplinary and international collaboration in research and education.

Key research focuses of the GHI include topics such as global health, applications of big data in health care and services, application of systems science in public health, mobile health (mHealth), child and maternal health, non-communicable chronic diseases, integrated health care, personalized health care development and dissemination, minority health and health disparities.

President of Xi'an Jiaotong University, Shuguo Wang

“GHI will take advantage of various resources from China and internationally to address global health problems,” President of Xi'an Jiaotong University Dr. Shuguo Wang says, “GHI cares about global health issues. When auniversity cares about the major problems in the society, it is destined to become a great university. A great university relies on great work.”

　　The mission of GHI is to catalyze and conduct innovative, multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research that responds to the changing global burden of disease and influences policy, publish high impact research papers, and become a worldwide leader in interdisciplinary global health education. From the perspective of research, GHI’s development will benefit from the strengths of Xi’an Jiaotong University’s colleges and disciplines and become a professional home of national and international leading experts. GHI will foster successful collaborations across multiple disciplines and institutions and provide solutions to major threats to public health in China and globally. Regarding education, GHI will develop formal graduate and post doc doctoral training programs and informal, short-, medium- and long-term training programs including certificate programs. In addition, taking advantage of the unique historical culture and international reputation of Xi’an, GHI will develop regular summerand winter training programs and help train researchers in new emerging fields such as big data and m Health, in response to the high demand of biomedical researchers, health professionals and policy makers in China and other countries along “the Belt and Road”.

The China West Scientific and Technological Innovation Harbour

In the future GHI will be located in the China West Scientific and Technological Innovation Harbour, about 25 km from Xi’an, being built and to be completed by 2018. The GHI’s future work will also benefit from the newly established “Universities Alliance of theSilk Road (UNSR)”, which included over 100 universities from approximately 40 countries, and is led by Xi'anJiaotong University. GHI will createa powerful platform for international partners to exchange health knowledge and research, provide services and implement solutions and policies regarding key health related problems in China and worldwide.

“This GHI willbe the first global health institute in West China and will help lead future directions in research, education, health promotion and social engagements, both in China and across the globe,” said Hong Yan, Vice-President of Xi'an Jiaotong University and Director of the Xi'an Jiaotong University Health Science Center.

Xi’an is a world famous city with a rich history and culture. As a central birthplace of the ancient Chinese civilization, the eastern terminus of the Silk Road and the site of the famous Terracotta Warriors of the Qin Dynasty, it has won a reputation all over the world. It has morethan 3,000 years of history, including serving for more than 1,100 years as the capital city of 13 ancient dynasties of China. Xi’an welcomes many leading scholars from around the globe to join its new global health initiative as marked by the new GHI. The GHI has a number of open faculty and research staff positions and will offer attractive training programs as well.