In this talk, Dr. Susana Ramírez explores the rapid global diffusion of public health policies aimed at mitigating the influence of industrial food marketing on rising rates of obesity and diabetes. Using front-of-package food labeling and sugary beverage taxes as case studies, Ramírez analyzes how these policies have spread across diverse national contexts despite resistance from powerful food and beverage industry actors. Drawing on original ethnographic research and textual analysis centering Latin America, Ramírez examines the role of epistemic communities — networks of public health experts, researchers, and policymakers — in constructing a set of scientific facts and building the evidence base for specific policy proposals. Ramírez also examines the strategic use of media to influence public opinion and counter industry disinformation, demonstrating how these strategies have redefined public health debates and facilitated the global spread of innovative policies. 

Ramírez is an expert in media, inequality, and health, as an “infodemiologist” — trained in both communication and public health — Ramírez uses social scientific methods to advance public health. A longstanding line of research considers the role of the public information environment on health outcomes and upends traditional behavioral research that (mis)characterizes Latinos, immigrants, and African Americans as having cultural orientations in opposition to healthy lifestyles. Rather, Ramírez’s findings provide a narrative for how communication may impact health disparities. Recent research extends this theorizing to advance understanding of the corporate and commercial determinants of health, including elaboration of a theoretical framework for racialized marketing. 

Professor Ramírez is co-editor of the Handbook of Language in Public Health and Healthcare (Wiley, 2024) and serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of Health Communication and the Journal of Communication in Health Care. Her work has been funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Buoy Health, and the Hellman Family Foundation and has been published in leading interdisciplinary journals including Social Science & Medicine, American Journal of Health Promotion, BMJ-Global Health, and Millbank Quarterly.

She is currently an associate professor of Public Health Communication at the University of California, Merced, where she teaches courses in social science research methods, health communication, and health policy. Ramírez earned a PhD in communication from the University of Pennsylvania, an MPH from Harvard University, and a BA in communication from Santa Clara University.