Community-based health care expert speaks at Ripon College Sept. 29

Community-based health care systems in Cuba and Central America will be addressed Sept. 29 at Ripon College by honored doctor and international speaker Dr. Luther Castillo Harry.

The talk, co-sponsored by the Center for Politics and the People and the Latin American and Caribbean Studies Program, will be presented from 4 to 5:30 p.m. in Kresge Little Theatre in East Hall on the campus. The public is invited to attend.

Castillo has built community-based health care systems at the Latin American School of Medicine in Cuba, as well as in his home country of Honduras. He will explain the inner workings of these systems and how they compare to health care systems in the United States.

Castillo attended the Latin American School of Medicine from 1999 to 2005, where he earned his degree as a medical doctor. Since then, he has been specialized in comprehensive family medicine from the same school and received his master’s degree in public administration from Harvard University.

He speaks at conferences across the United States and Europe, including Columbia University, Pitzer University and the Harvard University School of Medicine. In February, he spoke in the Session of the Commission for Social Development, Strengthening Service and Action for Social Development in a United Nations conference in New York.

His topics include the challenges of global health care, health care systems in developing countries and human rights in Honduras.

Awards and honors include Doctor of the Year for Honduras in 2008 and the 2011 Number 1 Doctor Award from the Bronx in New York.