Haas MBA/MPH Program

Hi guys

Great to see this thread. I'm an international applicant from India and Haas' MBA/MPH is my top choice for 2012 fall, but I'm in 2 minds as to what my chances are with this school and have started my research a month back. I'm currently an Analyst with Mckinsey & Co. Some questions for anybody who might know:

What are the other good dual US MBA/MPH programs you guys recommend? I'm only considering about 4 US schools so far and one Indian school, and a friend suggested that number was too little. I have looked into Wharton (will not be applying though), Carnegie Mellon's Tepper (will be applying), Vanderbilt Owen (may apply), Ross which has a "Healthcare focus" (may apply), Duke (not looked in depth, not sure). Any others?

Do they ever question you as to why Haas as opposed to say Wharton's/Duke's dual MBA/MPH? If they do, what are the key differences? I know one is that for those wishing to stay on the west coast, Haas is the way to go, but I'm indifferent.

I have weak social/community service participation on my resume; Haas, like most schools, has an entire essay dedicated to this! I'm guessing this would give me a huge disadvantage as compared to other applicants. Would it make sense for me to get more involved in this post GMAT (this August) and delay my apps to 2013 fall (by which time I'd have 5.5 years work experience, and 3.5 of those years in Mckinsey?)

Background:
All in all, I'll have about 4.5 years total work experience in two different industries by fall 2012. I'm rewriting my GMAT on August 3rd to push it to 700+

I'm a Research Analyst with Mckinsey & Co. - New Delhi, India office with currently 1.5 years work ex in this Firm. I work solely on the US Healthcare Payers & Provider (health insurance & hospitals/physicians) practice, working only with US teams. I know that the canadian Analyst I replaced went to Haas for the MBA/MPH (she left before I joined).

I also have ~2 yrs prior work experience in Client Servicing in the advertising industry (completely different). It will be difficult to explain this switch of course, as it had nothing to do with pharma/healthcare! I have a B.Sc. in Biology with 2 minors in Economics/Chem from Windsor, Canada

Any comments or advice that you may have would be extremely helpful. I am also in two minds as to whether I should get professional help in writing essays and selecting schools. So far, I have some peers/family that are in top corporate positions (or are B-school graduates) and I plan to run any future essays by them.

A.

Sorry to bring back an old thread but would admission to an MPH program increase chances to an MBA program say at HBS/Wharton/Yale?