Peter A. Newman is a full professor at the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work and an affiliate of the UofT Joint Centre for Bioethics. He is a former RBC Chair in Applied Social Work Research (2006-2008), Early Researcher Awardee from the Ministry of Research and Innovation, Ontario (2007-2011), and Canada Research Chair in Health and Social Justice (2007-2018). An Inaugural Fellow of the Society for Social Work and Research, he was recognized with the CSWE SOGIE Scholarship Award in 2012. Newman is co-founder, VOICES-Thailand Foundation (Chiang Mai), and a longstanding member of the U of T Health Sciences Research Ethics Board. He has been recognized as among the most highly cited social work scholars in North America.

Prof. Newman’s research program addresses global health and human rights, with a focus on HIV and sexual health among sexual and gender minorities, and racialized populations. His SSHRC Partnership grant, MFARR-Asia, comprises a 9-country multidisciplinary team that aims to collect and mobilize evidence to accelerate LGBTIQ inclusion and human rights in India, Thailand, Bangladesh, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Canada. #SafeHandsSafeHearts, an international multisite RCT of a peer counseling eHealth intervention co-led with Prof. Massaquoi and Women’s Health in Women’s Hands amid the Covid-19 pandemic, enrolled 850 participants, including racialized LGBTQ+ individuals in Toronto, demonstrating reductions in depression and increases in Covid-19 knowledge and protective behaviors—a model LGBTQ+-inclusive pandemic response. Project VOICES builds on the RCT to critically interrogate the construct of “vaccine hesitancy” amid social-structural constraints in access, and to promote culturally relevant interventions founded on informed decision-making and vaccine equity.

Links:

https://socialwork.utoronto.ca/profiles/peter-a-newman/

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