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| UM’s PhD candidate Ms. Liu Chao stood out from the rest applicants from around the world and received an internship offer from the WHO headquarters |
Ms. Liu Chao, a PhD candidate of the Institute of Chinese Medical Sciences (ICMS), the University of Macau (UM), received an internship offer from the World Health Organization (WHO) headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, to take part in global monitoring and evaluation of universal coverage of health services. Liu’s major is Biomedical Science, supervised by Prof. Wang Yitao, chair of the State Key Laboratory of Quality Research of Chinese Medicine and director of ICMS. Liu’s solid academic training, multidisciplinary background and rich international exchange experience combined to make her stand out from thousands of applicants from all over the world.
In 1982, WHO started to recruit interns from around the world. Competition for internships at the WHO headquarters in Geneva is particularly fierce and intern applications soared in the last two decades. In 2010 alone the WHO headquarters received nearly 12000 applications. About 4.3% of them were accepted, of which only 0.25% were from China (including Hong Kong). WHO is committed to developing future global leaders in public health. Its Internship Programme aims to select outstanding graduate students from all over the world to assist WHO with providing technical support and guidance to various countries, while also enhancing the participants’ knowledge and skills in particular fields. Another purpose of the programme is to enable the participants to better understand the operation and missions of WHO and co-discuss solutions to global-health-related issues.
The WHO headquarters is located in Geneva, Switzerland. Liu will work at the Health Financing Policy Department. A senior officer will be her supervisor. She expects to enhance her knowledge and accumulate useful work experience by taking part in relevant meetings and skill training programmes, and by assessing the benefit packages offered by different countries in collaboration with other interns.
Liu completed her undergraduate study at Nanjing University, where she focused on Molecule Medicine. She received her training in Health Economics and Pharmaceutical Economics at Peking University. She was also selected for participation in the Research Training and Mentoring Programme for Young Women Economists (funded by the Ford Foundation) and was awarded the PKU Chinese Young Health Economists Research Fellowship. She has published numerous academic papers and was invited to present a paper co-authored by her and her former supervisor at the seventh World Congress on Health Economics. In early 2010, she was invited by Tokyo University to give a presentation at the 15th International Congress of Oriental Medicine (ICOM) in Japan.
