The Commercial Determinants of Health

Dr. Salma Abdalla, a Sudanese medical doctor, is an Assistant Professor in Global Health and Epidemiology at Boston University School of Public Health. She has published over 50 scientific journal articles, co-authored 8 reports and policy briefs, and co-authored 9 book chapters. She was the Director of the Rockefeller-Boston University 3-D Commission on Determinants of health, Data science, and Decision making. She also served as a secretariat member for the WHO Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response during the COVID-19 pandemic. Her research focuses on understanding how microsocial forces shape the health of the population. In particular, she studies how data on the social, economic, and commercial determinants can be used to inform decision-making on health and health equity in different contexts. Dr. Abdalla also studies the effects of trauma on global population mental health.  

Professor Bero is a leader in evidence synthesis, meta-research and studying commercial determinants of health, focusing on tobacco control, pharmaceutical policy, and public health.  She provides international leadership for multidisciplinary teams that specialize in studying the quality, use and implementation of research for health and health policy. She is Senior Editor, Research Integrity for the Cochrane Collaboration and was Co-Chair of the Cochrane Governing Board 2014-18.

Dr. Bero has developed and validated qualitative and quantitative methods for assessing bias in the design, conduct and dissemination of research. She has pioneered the utilization of internal industry documents and transparency databases to understand corporate tactics and motives for influencing research evidence.

She is internationally recognized for her work on evidence synthesis, bias, conflicts of interest and use of evidence in decisions as shown by media coverage, speaking invitations and service on national and international committees, such as US National Academies of Science Committees, the World Health Organization Essential Medicines and guideline committees.

Nicholas Freudenberg is Distinguished Professor of Public Health at City University of New York School of Public Health and Faculty Director of Healthy CUNY, a university-wide effort to promote the health of CUNY students to support their academic success.

He is also Senior Faculty Fellow and co-founder of the CUNY Urban Food Policy Institute. His research examines the impact of food and social policies on urban food environments and health inequalities; strategies to bring the health, social and economic benefits of a college education to more students from low income, Black, Latino and immigrant communities; and public health approaches to reduce the harmful influences of commercial determinants of health. His two most recent books are At What Cost Modern Capitalism and the Future of Health (Oxford, 2021) and Lethal but Legal Corporations, Consumption and Protecting Public Health (Oxford, 2014 and 2016). Freudenberg was founder and first director of the CUNY School of Public Health’s Doctor of Public Health program. For the past 35 years, he has worked to plan, implement, and evaluate health policies and programs to improve living conditions and reduce health inequalities in low-income communities in New York City and elsewhere.

 Dr. van Schalkwyk is currently a Specialty Public Health Registrar and was an NIHR Academic Clinical Fellow from 2016 to 2019. She hold a Master’s degree in Public Health.

She completed a post-graduate medical degree at the University of Sydney, Australia. After immigrating to the UK, she worked as a Research Associate in the Research Oncology department at King’s College London. She then undertook the UK Foundation Programme at the South Thames Foundation School followed by a position in HIV Medicine at the Royal Free Hospital, London. This was followed by a position as a Clinical Research Fellow in Lung Oncology and Translational Medicine at Guy’s Hospital.

Dr. van Schalkwyk entered specialty training in August 2016 as a Public Health Specialty Registrar and Academic Clinical Fellow. During her Academic Clinical Fellowship her research focused on the commercial determinants of health as well as the impacts of trade and Brexit on public health. In 2020, she commenced her PhD on UK Gambling Policy as a NIHR Doctoral Fellow at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

Dr. van Schalkwyk’s research aims to forward understanding on how commercial and structural determinants affect health and health equity and how the activities of corporate actors influence ideas, knowledge, public discourse, and policy debates. Her academic work has been published in journals such as the BMJ, PLoS ONE, the Milbank Quarterly, Health Policy, Tobacco Control, International Journal of Health Policy and Management, and Globalization and Health.

Nicholas Florko is the commercial determinants of health reporter for STAT, reporting on how business decisions impact public health. Nick joined STAT in 2018 as a Washington correspondent and was the former author of the D.C. Diagnosis newsletter. He previously covered the Food and Drug Administration and drug pricing for Inside Health Policy.