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Colin Butler

Associate Professor of Medicine, Biology and Environment at Australian National University

Summary

I am mainly interested in the flourishing of global human health and well-being. There are many threats to this, including rising energy costs, climate change and the global disparity between rich and poor.

I studied medicine as a mature age student, and then became a whistle blower while a junior hospital resident, after witnessing gross mismanagement by and discrimination towards a peripheral Tasmanian hospital, in 1988. In 1989 I co-founded an NGO called BODHI, which is one of the oldest Buddhist influenced development organisations based in the West. BODHI now supports education and health projects in seven Asian nations, particularly in India.

My PhD was called "Inequality and Sustainability". It argues that global inequality generates “environmental brinkmanship”, ultimately risking the health of rich and poor.

Highlights of my academic career to date include work with the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, the World Medical Association and the Special Programme for Tropical Diseases Research. I am also a contributing author to the IPCC, on the topic of climate change and nutrition. I am a co-editor of EcoHealth, journal of the International Association of Ecology and Health. Currently, I have published 85 articles and chapters, and given invited lectures in 13 countries.

Experience

  • ARC Future Fellow, NCEPH. ANU 2011 – present
  • Associate Professor, ANU 2008 – 2011
  • Director, Benevolent Organisation for Health, Development and Insight (BODHI) 1989 – 2011
  • General Practitioner (mostly part time), Tasmania 1988 – 2008
  • Senior Research Fellow in Global Health, Deakin University 2006 – 2007

Education

  • Australian National University, PhD (epidemiology and population health), 2002
  • Univ. of London, UK, MSc (epidemiology), 1997
  • London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK, Dip LSH&TM, 1997
  • Royal College Physicians, London, DTM&H, 1990
  • University of Newcastle, NSW, BMed, 1987
  • University of Newcastle, NSW, BMedSci (Hons), 1984

Publications

  • AJ McMichael +CDB: Promoting global population health while constraining the environmental f/print, Annual Review of Public Health. 32: 179-197 2011
  • Butler C.D. The climate crisis, global health, and the medical response, World Medical Journal. 56(2):56-8 2010
  • Butler C.D. North and South, The., Int'l Encyclopaedia Social Sciences (Ed: A. Hedblad) New York: MacMillan Ref USA, Vol 5:542-4 2007
  • Butler C.D. and McMichael A.J. (2006): Environmental health, Social Injustice and Public Health (Eds: BS Levy, VW Sidel, Oxford: Oxf Univ Press, pp 318-36. 2006
  • McMichael A.J., Butler C.D. and Folke C. New visions for addressing sustainability, State of the Planet 2006-07 (Eds: D. Kennedy et al) Island Press, Washington DC, pp 161-6. 2006
  • Butler C.D. Overpopulation, overconsumption and economics, The Lancet 343: 582-4 1994

Research Areas

  • Public Health And Health Services (1117)
  • Other Environmental Sciences (0599)

Grants and Contracts

  • Health and sustainability: Australia in a global context (2011)
    • Role: Sole applicant
    • Funding Source: Australian Research Council

Honours

One of "100 doctors for the planet" French Environmental Health Association (2009)

Available for

  • Speaking Engagements
  • Talking With Students
  • Media Interviews