[Webinar] Face Masks: From Medicine to Culture, from Culture to Medicine

On July 31, I joined Dr. Michael Tan, professor, academician, and medical anthropologist, in giving a webinar entitled "Face Masks: From Medicine to Culture, from Culture to Medicine" organized by the Museo ng Kaalamang Katutubo (MUSKKAT). 

My lecture reflected on the meanings and efficacies of face masks, arguing that they are actually a familiar response to crises, and that they have come to signify conformity and 'good citizenship' even as also reflects people's individuality and personal preferences as part of an emergent bodily culture.

Some of the themes I presented are summarized in my Inquirer column the previous day.

[Webinar] ISSDP-UNODC - A scientific look at the 2020 World Drug Report

As a drug policy scholar and member of the International Society for the Study of Drug Policy (ISSDP), I participated in a webinar jointly organized by the ISSDP and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) on the occasion of the release of the 2020 World Drug Report, on July 2, 2020.

The webinar featured an overview of the World Drug Report by by Angela Me (Chief Research and Trend Analysis Branch, UNODC), followed by reactions from Suzanne Nielsen of Monash University, Alexander Soderholm of the London School of Economics and Political Science, and myself, with Alex Stevens (University of Kent) and Kaitlin Hughes (Flinders University) serving as moderators. 

In the webinar, I welcomed the attention to the socio-economic linkages of drug use, but argued that beyond looking at the impacts of drug use disorders on people's socio-economic lives, we should also look at how people's socio-economic contexts shape their use of drugs - both problematic and non-problematic.