STIFTUNG SWISS SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH PLUS (SSPH)

Their core work

SSPH+ is a Swiss foundation that unites the public health faculties of eight leading Swiss universities into a single inter-university school for teaching, doctoral training and research in public health sciences. Their core work is designing and delivering advanced academic programmes — especially PhD curricula — that integrate epidemiology, health economics, social health sciences, health law and health promotion. They also contribute as a research partner on European population-health initiatives, bringing Swiss cohort and public-health expertise into pan-European consortia. In practice, they function as both a graduate school and a coordinating hub for Swiss public health academia on the European stage.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

In their earlier H2020 engagement (2017 HBM4EU), the emphasis was scientific — human biomonitoring, exposure and effect biomarkers, endocrine disruptors and chemical-mixture reference values. From 2018 onward they pivoted firmly toward capacity-building and training, taking the coordinator seat on GlobalP3HS with a focus on health economics, health law, prevention, doctorate training and international secondment. The trajectory is clear: from contributing Swiss expertise to environmental-health science, to leading the education of the next generation of European public health researchers.

They are consolidating as a coordinator of international doctoral and research-training programmes, making them a strong partner for anyone building MSCA, COFUND or capacity-building proposals in public health.

How they like to work

SSPH+ plays two distinct roles: a heavyweight coordinator when the project is about public health training and education, and a specialist third-party contributor when it is about environmental-health science. Their single coordinator project is a very large, wide-consortium effort (115 unique partners across 30 countries), suggesting they are comfortable operating as a hub rather than a niche collaborator. Partnering with them works best when training architecture, Swiss academic reach and multi-disciplinary public health integration are part of the plan.

Across just two projects they connect to 115 unique partners in 30 countries, reflecting the global PhD consortium they lead. Their network skews European-academic with a strong international reach through MSCA-COFUND mobility.

What sets them apart

SSPH+ is not a single university group — it is the joint inter-university school of Swiss public health, which means one agreement effectively plugs a consortium into eight Swiss faculties at once. They are unusual in combining deep Swiss cohort and biomonitoring capability with the institutional infrastructure to run a large international doctoral programme. For consortia, they bring both scientific content and a ready-made training delivery platform, which few partners can offer in one package.

Highlights from their portfolio

• GlobalP3HS
  Their flagship: a EUR 4.58M MSCA-COFUND global PhD programme in public health sciences that they coordinate, anchoring their role as a training hub.
• HBM4EU
  Involvement in Europe's flagship human biomonitoring initiative on endocrine disruptors and chemical mixtures shows their reach beyond education into environmental-health science.