France is a strong destination for public health studies. The country combines universal health coverage with high mandatory health-insurance funding and high life expectancy, giving students a useful setting for studying health systems, prevention, and population health.
French universities also emphasize research and practical experience, which can strengthen students’ learning and help graduates address health disparities with a broader international perspective.
While public health programs vary by specialization, language of instruction, and format, here are some leading public health study options in France:
Top Schools Offering Public Health Programs in France
1. Paris Cité University
Université Paris Cité offers the Master in Public Health – Comparative Effectiveness in Research, a one-year, full-time second-year master’s pathway taught entirely in English. The program is offered by professors from Université Paris Cité and partner institutions including Amsterdam University, Danube University, Ioannina University, Oxford University, Queen’s University Belfast, Utrecht University, and York University. The course aims to develop students’ skills in methods, epidemiology, and biostatistics, preparing them to use public health methods for therapeutic and comparative assessment, health information systems, risk assessment and management, health safety, and healthcare quality.
The curriculum includes general biostatistics, clinical epidemiology, modeling, biomedical computing, epidemiology, clinical research, and risk assessment. Students also complete a six-month internship and write and defend a thesis.
According to the university, this program is a first of its kind in Europe and is limited to 30 students, supporting small-group and interactive teaching.
2. University of Paris-Saclay
The University of Paris-Saclay offers a Public Health master’s degree built around common first-year training in public health methods followed by specialized second-year pathways. The first year provides training in biostatistics, clinical research, epidemiology, and methods from the humanities and social sciences that support collective approaches to health.
At the second-year level, students can specialize through six pathways: Research in Public Health; Methodology and Statistics in Biomedical Research; Health Data Sciences; Methodology of Public Health Interventions; Epidemiology and Surveillance of Human and Animal Infectious Diseases; and Public Health and Environmental Risks.
Research in Public Health prepares students to formulate research questions, design study protocols, conduct quantitative or qualitative analyses, and write scientific articles in areas such as epidemiology, clinical research, and healthcare organization and health systems. Methodology and Statistics in Biomedical Research trains biomedical research methodologists to build protocols and statistical analysis plans. Health Data Sciences focuses on managing, analyzing, and interpreting high-dimensional health data using statistical modeling, machine learning, and biomedical data-science tools.
Methodology of Public Health Interventions is oriented toward population health, health promotion, work-and-environment topics, project management, and intervention evaluation. Epidemiology and Surveillance of Human and Animal Infectious Diseases focuses on surveillance of communicable diseases in human and animal health from a One Health perspective. Public Health and Environmental Risks covers environment-related health risks, including occupational, chemical, industrial, urban, and One Health risk themes.
Many Paris-Saclay public health pathway pages list French as the language of instruction, and applicants should check the specific pathway page for current language, schedule, internship, and admission requirements before applying.
3. University of Bordeaux
The University of Bordeaux offers the Master 2 Public Health Data Science program at ISPED as the master’s-level specialization of its Digital Public Health program. This international, multidisciplinary, data-centered program focuses on epidemiology, statistics, and informatics, uses authentic case studies from the Bordeaux Population Health Research Center, and is taught entirely in English.
Students develop skills in translating public health and clinical problems into research questions, designing research plans, using supervised statistical analysis and modeling, applying statistical learning and data mining, and managing and analyzing large-scale health data. The program was developed by teams from the Bordeaux Population Health Center and the Bordeaux School of Public Health, and it is designed to train future digital public health leaders, including chief data scientists and public health data-science professionals in public and private sectors.
4. Ecole des hautes études en santé publique
EHESP French School of Public Health, or Ecole des hautes études en santé publique, offers an English-taught Master of Public Health for international students through a multidisciplinary public health perspective. Its first-year core curriculum covers five disciplines: social and behavioral sciences, health policy and management, epidemiology, information sciences and biostatistics, and environmental and occupational health. Students also work on case studies in small groups and are encouraged to complete a two- to three-month internship during the first year.
This program is a strong choice for students interested in broad-based public health roles in government, NGOs, research institutions, healthcare organizations, or private organizations, either in France or internationally.
EHESP’s MPH course has APHEA validation from March 2022 for six years, and the school’s APHEA institutional accreditation has been renewed until 2027. The school also lists HCERES accreditation and a renewed three-star “Bienvenue en France” label, granted from March 13, 2024, for five years.
France is a strong option for students who want to understand public health through health systems, research methods, epidemiology, data science, environmental health, and policy perspectives.
We hope this article on public health programs in France was helpful. For more available courses, check out the Study in France and Available Programs in Europe!
