Courtland Robinson

I have worked in the refugee field since 1979, with positions in the United States (Indochina Refugee Action Center and the US Committee for Refugees) and internationally (Save the Children, World Education, Mercy Corps and the Asian Research Center for Migration). Since 1998, I have been at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health where I received my PhD in Demography and am now an Associate Professor in the Department of International Health (with a joint appointment in the Department of Population, Family and Reproductive Health) and core faculty in the Center for Humanitarian Health. My research interests focus on populations in migration, whether displaced by conflict, natural disaster or widespread human rights abuse; or in the context of migrant labor and human trafficking (especially trafficking into forced labor). Interests include: Population-based surveys and population estimation of marginalized and mobile groups, measuring impact of migration and displacement on physical and mental health; mortality studies applying demographic principles in field settings; access to health care and health systems among displaced and migrant populations; operations research in complex emergency and crisis settings; and health policy for migrants, refugees, displaced persons and survivors of human trafficking. Recent research and projects focus on estimation of North Korean refugee populations in China (including estimating population size and vulnerability characteristics of children born to North Korean mothers in China); developing models to estimate numbers of unaccompanied and separated children in emergencies; and estimating prevalence of human trafficking among Burmese displaced populations in Thailand.