Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response[1] was established jointly by the University of Oxford and The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) as a non-profit research centre to carry out research, training and community knowledge transfer in the area of disaster and medical humanitarian response in Greater China and the Asia–Pacific region.
[2] It is housed in the CUHK Faculty of Medicine and its director is Emily Ying Yang Chan as of 2016.
[citation needed] CCOUC aims to minimise the negative health impact of disasters experienced by vulnerable populations in the region by serving as a platform for research, education, and community knowledge transfer in the areas of disaster and medical humanitarian crisis policy development, planning, and response.
[8][9] CCOUC also runs an Ethnic Minority Health Project in China to study and promote disaster preparedness and public health in remote rural villages in the country's inland western provinces[10] The Centre has participated in the World Health Organization (WHO)'s consultation meeting on disaster health risk management and established international co-operation with leading institutions in the field, including the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED)[11] in Belgium, and Harvard Humanitarian Initiative[12] and FXB Center for Health and Human Rights[13] at Harvard University.
[15] The Centre has also been appointed Sphere Country Focal Point for China since August 2014 to promote the internationally recognised minimum standards in humanitarian response for the Geneva-based International Sphere Project.