Environmental Science, at Gunpoint
As a young doctor, Diddier Prada wanted to bring his medical skills to cocoa planters in the Colombian Amazon. But then he and his fellow doctors were kidnapped by a group of paramilitary guerillas and required to treat hundreds of patients a day—at gunpoint. Today, Dr. Prada brings the skills of resilience and flexibility he learned in South America to performing environmental justice research at Mount Sinai.
[00:00:00] Stephen Calabria: From the Mount Sinai Health System in New York City. This is Road to Resilience, a podcast about facing adversity. I'm your host, Stephen Calabria, Mount Sinai's Director of Podcasting.
[00:00:12] On this episode, we welcome Didier Prada, MD, PhD, an Assistant Professor for Health Equity Research in the Department of Population Health Science and Policy and the Department of Environmental Medicine and Public Health at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
[00:00:27] Professor Prada's research delves into the impact that humans have on the environment, and in turn, the effects the environment has on humans. Things like air pollution, soot, toxins, and other environmental hazards are all subjects of his research, as well as the ways to mitigate their harm.
[00:00:43] Dr. Prada's contributions to environmental health research has earned him significant recognition among his peers. It also brought him face to face with Colombian drug cartels, and almost cost him his life.
[00:00:54] We're honored to have Professor Didier Prada on the show.
[00:00:59] Professor Diddier Prada, welcome to Road to Resilience.
[00:01:02] Diddier Prada: Thank you, Stephen. It's an honor to be here.
[00:01:04] Stephen Calabria: Could you share a little bit about your background and how you became interested in environmental medicine and climate science?
[00:01:11] Diddier Prada: Absolutely. Well, first, I was born in Colombia. I'm the second son of a low income family in Colombia. But since my very early ages, I wanted to become a doctor at some point, in a way that I could alleviate the suffering of my people in some way.
[00:01:27] All my life I studied in public school, so I went to a public medical school in Bucaramanga, Colombia, in my hometown. And during those years, I want to use that knowledge for help my people.
[00:01:40] So, after my medical school, I spent three years in the rural areas in Colombia, including the Colombian Amazon, providing health care, primary health care to farmers, to coca planters, those areas in Colombia, that's the only way that people can afford, food, shelter for them and for their families.