John Robert Doe
Jonathan Edwards College
Kingsley Trust Association Fellowship Proposal
Religion in Defense of the Public’s Health: Leprosy in Brazil
Although eradicated in Western
developed countries, leprosy persists as a major
public health problem in many developing
countries. Recent estimates from the World
Health Organization (WHO) suggest that as
many as twenty million people worldwide are
living with the disease, with as many as 900,000
new cases annually. Throughout the long
history of the human experience with leprosy,
there have been deep religious and moral
associations with the disease and its sufferers.
essay opens with a general introduction to the
topic, narrowing the focus as it moves through
the introduction (here, leprosy generally, to the
associations between religion and disease)
With a Kingsley Trust Association
Fellowship, I propose to study the role of
religion and spirituality in current public health
efforts against leprosy in Brazil, which has the
second highest number of cases after India.
Brazil’s public health campaign against leprosy
consists of efforts led by its federal public health
department, by international health organizations
such as the WHO, and by private nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). I will
focus on the programs of the private NGOs
which frequently are religiously-affiliated
missionary groups. Through archival research,
visits to hospitals, and interviews with patients,
public health officials, missionaries, and
government officials, I will attempt to answer
three questions: what role does religion play in
public health efforts in Brazil? What
consequences do the religious associations pose
for patients with leprosy and their healthcare
givers? Are there aspects of leprosy control
measures pursued by religious organizations that
can be utilized against other diseases?
what do you propose to do in your project?
After discussing my project with
Professor Winslow Homer in the Global Health
Program and with Professor Joseph De Veuster
in the Yale Divinity School’s Overseas Missions
Research Center, I will study the work of the
Leprosy Mission International (LMI), which is
based in the United Kingdom and which
maintains the largest private leprosy eradication
program in Brazil. LMI operates forty hospitals
in Brazil’s twenty-six states. I requested and
was granted permission by Dr. Jose Serra, LMI’s
medical director in Brazil, to visit three LMI
who have you consulted with on the Yale faculty
that might serve as a mentor or advise you on
the project?
where do you want to go and why?
how will you find answers to your questions?
what questions will you seek to address?
who have you contacted at your destinations and
have they agreed to help you?
John Robert Doe
Jonathan Edwards College
hospitals in Rio de Janeiro, Bahia, and Santa
Catarina. I selected these hospitals because they
represent the range of LMI’s operations in
Brazil, with respect to scale and to collaboration
with governmental authorities. Dr. Serra has
indicated that he will contact the individual
hospitals once the dates of my visits are fixed.
At the hospitals, I will interview patients, health
care workers, and volunteers to understand how
their religious commitments affect their
treatment and service to the sick. When
permitted, I will record these interviews for later
use; otherwise, I will maintain extensive notes of
my discussions.
Kingsley Trust Association Fellowship Proposal
why were these particular sites selected?
how will you find answers to your core
questions? (in this case, interviews)
how will you document your experience?
I have also contacted Drs. Nísia Trindade
Lima and Paulo Basso in Brazil’s health
ministry and they and their colleagues have
agreed to meet me during my stay in Brazil. In
meeting with them, I hope to understand their
attitudes toward the efforts of religious
organizations. Do those efforts complement or
interfere with state public health campaigns?
How do these efforts differ and how are they the
same? How is the success of these efforts
measured? The leprosy research unit at the
Fundação Oswaldo Cruz (FIOCRUZ), a leading
private medical foundation, have agreed to allow
me to be affiliated with their institute during my
stay in Bahia. The foundation instituted the
earliest leprosy eradication programs in Brazil
beginning in the 1920s, and their extensive
library and archival holdings document the
development of these programs and the entry of
religious organizations in these efforts after
World War II. I believe that my experience in
preparing a research paper for Professor Stuart
Schwartz’s course on Latin American politics
will serve me in negotiating the archival
holdings. My intermediate-level Portuguese will
be aided by a dictionary and some well-timed
questions to the archivists when necessary.
who have you contacted at your destinations and
have they agreed to help you?
I expect to arrive in Rio de Janeiro in
early June for what will be the beginning of ten
weeks in Brazil. I will spend the first three
weeks in Rio meeting with members of LMI’s
administration and officials of the health
ministry and doing research in the medical
library at Universidade Federal do Rio de
Janeiro (UFRJ). The UFRJ library holds
when do you want to go?
who have you contacted at your destinations and
have they agreed to help you?
how will you find answers to your core
questions? (in the case, archival research and
library holdings)
what special skills or preparation do you have to
undertake this project?
what challenges or difficulties do you anticipate
your project will pose and how you overcome
them?
how long will you spend in each city and what
will you do while there?
where do you want to go? (in this instance, a
specific resource to be used and the rationale of
for why it must be used in the specific locale)
John Robert Doe
Jonathan Edwards College
journals and publications in Portugese and
Spanish that are not available in the United
States. During this time, I will also spend time
at the Hospital Universitário Gaffrée e Guinle
interviewing patients, care givers, and others. In
the last week of June, I will move on to the LMI
hospital at Santa Catarina in southern Brazil for
a three-week stay. My time in Santa Catarina
will be devoted solely to interviewing patients
and staff. In mid-July, I will head north to Bahia
for the remaining four weeks, where I will visit
LMI’s Sao Rafael Hospital and conduct research
at Fundação Oswaldo Cruz as I described
earlier.
This project emerges out of my interest in
understanding the place that religion has and can
have in matters of public policy and in this case,
international public health, a field in which I
hope to pursue a career after completing medical
school. While the project does not immediately
relate to my double majors in physics and
theatre, it raises questions for me that are
personally important and that I believe will gain
wider importance as we continue to face public
health challenges. As the HIV pandemic
continues unabated and as newly emerging
infectious diseases such as SARS poses new
challenges for public health officials, the
example of leprosy eradication programs in
Brazil can offer some insight into future public
health campaigns.
Word Count: 1,127 w/ notes
FellReports&Data/MeetingsHandouts/SampleKingslyProposal/ 2.3.04/dgj
Kingsley Trust Association Fellowship Proposal
how long will you spend in each city and what
will you do while there?
how long will you spend in each city and what
will you do while there?
why is this project important to you?
how will the experience of this project serve to
advance your personal, academic, or career
goals?
why might this project be important to us?