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Global Health Security Seminar Series: Fall 2022 Schedule

The 2022-2023 seminar series will highlight the work of faculty and researchers at Georgetown University, with a focus on public health emergencies. This series will be an opportunity to present works in progress, share areas of research, and engage in dialogue with fellow researchers. The events will occur in person every other Wednesday from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. ET in the Maguire Hall 304 conference room. They will also be available via Zoom.

Please RSVP using the Google forms below and indicate whether you will be attending in-person or online.

September 14, 2022

“Climate and Infectious Disease: The View from the Event Horizon”

Colin J. Carlson is an assistant professor in the Center for Global Health Science and Security at Georgetown University. His research program in global change biology focuses on the interplay between climate change, disease emergence, and public policy. He is also the director of Verena, a National Science Foundation (NSF) Biology Integration Institute working to harness molecular biology to predict and prevent viral emergence. Across his work in climate and health, he frequently interfaces with policymakers either directly or through science-policy interfaces like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. Most recently, Carlson is co-principal investigator of the Carnegie Endowment-funded Pandemic Treaty Project, which examines the elements of planetary health, epidemic preparedness, good governance, and justice that are essential to post-COVID-19 international law reform.

RSVP for September 14

September 28, 2022

“Participatory Action Research on Cross-sector Collaboration around Climate Event Recovery: Ghana and Northern California”

Jessica Kritz is a participatory action researcher focused on cross-sector collaboration around complex health challenges. In the United States, her current projects involve COVID-19 response in a rural, Appalachian county in North Carolina and the homelessness crisis, created by wildfires, in Chico, California. Since 2015, Kritz has been the principal investigator on an empirical research project in Ghana to resolve complex health challenges. She worked with stakeholders and a local facilitator to educate stakeholders on the best evidence on cross-sector collaboration, and they used that evidence to develop a culturally appropriate cross-sector collaboration intervention to address the challenges. The research began with three stakeholders in Old Fadama, the largest urban slum in Accra. Now with data from 300 core stakeholders and more than 15,000 beneficiaries, the intervention has been replicated in other slums in Accra and Kumasi and rural communities in northern Ghana, using local resources. This cross-sector collaboration intervention worked where other, more traditional development projects did not: a low-cost, locally-designed tool that dramatically improved participation and resulted in numerous projects providing new services to Ghana's most vulnerable. The project is currently being scaled up with support of the Ghana national government.

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October 12, 2022

“Practical, Field-Tested Approaches to Implementing Laboratory Biosafety in Conflict-Prone Settings”

Erin M. Sorrell is a member of the Center for Global Health Science and Security, an assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Georgetown University, and the director of the Elizabeth R. Griffin Program at the Center for Global Health Science and Security. Sorrell is also the director of and teaches in the Biohazardous Threat Agents and Emerging Infectious Diseases M.Sc. Program. Sorrell works with partners across the U.S. government, international organizations, and ministries around the world to identify elements required to support health systems strengthening and laboratory capacity building for disease detection, reporting, risk assessment, and response. She is also interested in operational and implementation research questions related to sustainable health systems strengthening, with an emphasis on the prevention, management, and control of infectious diseases in humanitarian situations, and particularly countries and regions affected by conflict.

RSVP for October 12 

October 26, 2022

“European Union Response to COVID-19 and EU Health Security Law”

Michael A. Stoto is a professor emeritus in the Department of Health Management and Policy in the School of Health at Georgetown University. He is also an adjunct professor of biostatistics and senior preparedness fellow at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health. A statistician, epidemiologist, and health services researcher, Stoto’s research includes methodological topics in epidemiology and statistics including systematic reviews/meta-analysis and other analytical methods for comparative effectiveness research, community health assessment, evaluation methods, and performance measurement. His substantive research interests include public health practice, especially with regard to emergency preparedness, drug and vaccine safety, infectious disease policy, and ethical issues in research and public health practice.

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December 7, 2022

“Death, Inequality, and the Pandemic in the Nation's Capital”

Maria Alva is an assistant research professor at the Massive Data Institute in the McCourt School of Public Policy. Her research focuses on impact evaluations of health care interventions, and the cost-effectiveness of preventive decisions. She works primarily in the area of behavioral health and noncommunicable diseases. Alva started her economics career at the University of Oxford, where her research focused on economic analyses of the United Kingdom Prospective Diabetes Study—a landmark trial of policies to improve the management of people with type 2 diabetes. Before joining Georgetown, Alva worked as a senior research associate at Impaq International and as a health economist in the division of public health and policy research at RTI International.

RSVP for December 7