July 22nd 2015

Report on MNUMS and CR Conference held in Ulaanbaatar, MN June 2015

The Mongolian National University of Medical Science (MNUMS) and the Collegium Ramazzini (CR) organized a Conference on Occupational and Environmental Health in Construction and Mining Sectors on 22-24 June 2015 in Ulaanbaatar, MN. The audience of approximately 70 included representatives from the Mongolian Construction and Mining sectors, NGOs, labor and Mongolian Government including the Ministry of Labor.

Participating CR Fellows included: Arthur Frank, Carol Rice, Morando Soffritti, Margrit von Braun, and Denny Dobbin. CR Fellow Knut Ringen helped substantially with conference planning, especially on the Construction Sector part of the program, and submitted a paper on the Principles of Occupational Safety and Injury Prevention, that was read at the conference. Also participating from abroad were Ian von Lindern, Casey Bartrem, Tom Gassert, Elke Brinkmann and Petr Sharov.

As international guests at the MNUMS, we were enthusiastic about the potential of helping with occupational and environmental health problems there to supplement recent activities by CR Fellow Ellen Silbergeld and Johns Hopkins University through their Fogarty grant. CR Fellow Ken Takahashi from Japan has students from Mongolia and our colleagues from the Korea OSHA have given technical support and training over the past several years. Elke Brinkmann is a German Occupational Physician who has just started with the Mongolian Occupational Health Research Center, and is supported by GIZ the German development agency.

Conference topics covered: 1) Development of Occupational and Environmental Health in Mongolia; 2) Principles of Occupational and Environmental Health; 3) OSH in the Construction Sector in Mongolia; 4) OSH in Mining Sector in Mongolia; 5) Protecting Communities With Respect to Mining Waste Management and Remediation in Mongolia. Small-group discussion was held among participants to develop recommendations for action plans for next steps for OSH in Construction and Mining Sectors in Mongolia.

Recommendations were made regarding actions and key players necessary to effect change. These were made in summary and reported in the final session of the conference and will soon to be made available in English. Following the conference the CR delegation met with President Batbaatar Gunchin, MNUMS and Dean Chimedsuren Ochir, School of Public Health, MNUMS and elected CR Fellow about a possible agreement for future collaboration with the Collegium Ramazzini. We also met with Ochirbat Dagvadorj, Director of the Occupational Health Research Center, Ministry of Labor of Mongolia, who also expressed interest in future collaboration with the Collegium Ramazzini. The conference planning committee included co-chairs Arthur Frank and Naransukh Damiran, and Knut Ringen and Denny Dobbin.