Epidemiology

A spontaneous, collaborative effort for early diagnosis of infectious outbreaks

October 11, 2016

Preparedness is also made of vigilance towards new infectious threats. Professor Bert Niesters from the University of Groningen, in the Netherlands, tells ASSET an example of spontaneous cooperation among 42 laboratories from more than 20 countries in Europe in facing an emerging, dangerous infection: enterovirus D68 respiratory epidemic in 2014-2015. That experience is now going on, taking the name of EUROTYPE.

Target: 
Government and Public Health, Healthcare Professionals
Topic: 
Epidemiology
Tags: 
Video, Preparedness, enterovirus

Paper series 1 - Science for and with Society aiming to the public health emergencies response and preparedness

Tuesday, August 30, 2016 - 14:56

Athena Linos, European Institute of Women’s Health, Alberto d’Onofrio

Target: 
Citizens, Decision Makers, Government and Public Health, Healthcare Professionals
Topic: 
Epidemiology, Gender, Vaccination
Tags: 
science-in-society, gender issues, Vaccine, flu, influenza, behaviour, mathematics
PDF icon paper_series_1_-_science_for_and_with_society_aiming_to_the_public_health_emergencies_response_and_preparedness.pdf

Habits can spread epidemics: the case of living poultry markets in China

July 29, 2016

Living poultry markets, common in China and in other eastern countries, are a typical example of how societal factors can be relevant in the spread of infectious diseases. A science-with-and-for-society approach should therefore find a way to solve this problem without fostering people hostility towards authorities. Even if central slaughters would be the simplest solutions, people would not accept them. Ivan Hung, Clinical Associate Professor and Honorary Consultant in the Department of Medicine at the Queen Mary Hospital of the University of Hong Kong, explains how this issue can be dealt with, in the fight against H7N9 bird flu virus and other new strains.

Target: 
Citizens, Government and Public Health, Healthcare Professionals
Topic: 
Epidemiology
Tags: 
Video, H7N9, epidemic, flu

Risk communication and infectious diseases in an age of digital media

Monday, July 11, 2016 - 15:21

Gesser-Edelsburg A, Shir-Raz Y. 1st ed. UK: Routledge; 2017.

 

Target: 
Decision Makers
Topic: 
Epidemiology
Tags: 
risk communication

Zika won’t stop Olympic games

Thursday, July 7, 2016 - 08:03

A debate is ongoing if Olympic Games should be cancelled, moved or delayed because of the Public Health Emergency of International Concern declared by WHO on 1st February 2016 on microcephaly in Brazil, which is being proven to be associated with Zika infection. On May 25th, 150 experts in bioethics, public health and social sciences signed an open letter to the WHO, asking to skip the Games, in order to avoid a further spread of the epidemic.

Target: 
Citizens, Decision Makers, Government and Public Health
Topic: 
Epidemiology, Prevention
Tags: 
zika, Risk perception, Risk management, WHO, transparency, Uncertainty

“Pandemic”: a misleading word

June 30, 2016

Albert Osterhaus, director of the Research Center for Emerging Infections and Zoonoses (RIZ) in Hannover, Germany, and Chairman of the European Working group on Influenza (ESW), is one of the top virologist in the world, who has discovered more than 50 new viruses over the last decades. In this short video he explains why the word “pandemic” can be a cause of misunderstanding between health authorities and the public, as it happened in 2009, when the new emerging flu virus A(H1N1) turned out to be milder than expected in the beginning.

Target: 
Citizens, Government and Public Health
Topic: 
Epidemiology
Tags: 
Video, pandemic, H1N1

“One Health”: vaccinate camels to protect people from MERS

May 11, 2016

Albert Osterhaus, director of the Research Center for Emerging Infections and Zoonoses (RIZ) in Hannover, Germany, is also a vet and a strong promoter of the One Health movement, which aims to consider animals and humans together, as possible sources and vectors of emerging diseases. In his lab MERS-Cov was discovered, which has caused thousands of cases and hundreds of deaths so far, mainly in the Middle East and in Korea. He has studied a new strategy to counteract this disease, vaccinating the dromedary camels, which are the main source of human infections.

Target: 
Decision Makers, Government and Public Health
Topic: 
Epidemiology, Microbiology, Vaccination
Tags: 
Video, Vaccine, MERS

Cooperation and engagement for a polio-free world

Friday, May 6, 2016 - 11:11

“We are so close to ending the polio” and “Still 15 years to a polio-free world” are not contradictory statements. They instead describe, with different degree of optimism, the current framework and the objective to be pursued in the fight against this disease. In other words, we are closer than ever to the target of a world free of polio, but much remains to be done to carry the world across the threshold. Polio eradication is the next issue public health authorities will be committed to in midterm future.

Target: 
Citizens, Decision Makers, Government and Public Health, Healthcare Professionals, Industry & Commerce, School and Education
Topic: 
Epidemiology, Media, Microbiology, Prevention, Stakeholders, Vaccination
Tags: 
polio, Vaccine, Vaccine safety, Surveillance, engagement, ECDC

WHO launched an app against Zika

Tuesday, March 22, 2016 - 14:55

During the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) developed an application that allowed people to share information on the spread of the contagion, which proved to be very useful to monitor the situation. Now that the Zika virus outbreak is raising concerns, would it be possible to use a similar approach? Some weeks ago, the experts of the CDC argued that developing an app to track the spread of Zika virus would not be as effective as it was with Ebola.

Target: 
Citizens, Healthcare Professionals
Topic: 
Epidemiology
Tags: 
zika, WHO, CDC, Ebola

Using the web to track flu and other infectious diseases

Wednesday, February 17, 2016 - 15:29

Flutrackers is an online platform that gather information about infectious diseases from journals, news sources and citizens around the world. It was started in 2006 by a diverse group of volunteers, initially interested in investigating seasonal influenza, novel influenza, and chikungunya. In later years, we expanded our range by including other health threats such as the Ebola and Zika viruses, and drug resistant bacteria.

Target: 
Decision Makers, Government and Public Health
Topic: 
Citizens' Mobilization, Epidemiology, Human Rights, Microbiology, Prevention
Tags: 
flu, influenza, Surveillance

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