SPEAKER: Alasdair Cohen Project Scientist College of Natural Resources and Berkeley Water Center University of California, Berkeley DATE: Wednesday, October 24, 2018 TIME: 4:00-5:30pm PLACE: 126 Barrows TITLE: Understanding and Advancing Access to Safe Drinking Water in Rural China DESCRIPTION: This talk will center on UC Berkeley’s water-and-health focused research collaboration with the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC). I will discuss our 2013-2014 rural water treatment field research and explain how our analyses revealed that, among treatment methods, electric kettles were associated with the safest water, while bottled water was frequently contaminated. Key socioeconomic factors which appear to predict water treatment preferences (and associated air pollution exposure) will also be discussed. The talk will close with an introduction to the Berkeley/China-CDC Program for Water & Health and the ongoing, 900-household, randomized controlled trial this research spurred. BIO: Alasdair Cohen is a Project Scientist with the UC Berkeley College of Natural Resources and Berkeley Water Center. He received his PhD in Environmental Science, Policy & Management, and an MPH in Epidemiology, from UC Berkeley, as well as an MSc from Oxford. Dr. Cohen conducts research on water contamination, treatment, supply, and environmental health. He has also worked for United Nations agencies on water management and indicator development projects. At Berkeley, he has taught courses on randomized controlled trials and water & development policy. In August 2019, Cohen will start as an Assistant Professor of Environmental Epidemiology at Virginia Tech.