Category: News

On May 6, doctoral fellow Sushma Dahal presented on her work with Dr. Gerardo Chowell. Watch “Excess mortality patterns during influenza pandemics” here:

https://hioa365-my.sharepoint.com/:v:/g/personal/jara_oslomet_no/EeITPsHuSihGtqFG7nO-DVEBoGvhCXrMwVQbQG7JzWYpIA?e=AYiSDM

Prof. Chowell-Puente, is at Department of Population Health Sciences, Georgia State University School of Public Health, Atlanta, GA, USA.

Please send e-mail to masv@oslomet.no if you wish to participate in this webinar.

Blurb: Multiple factors such as low testing rates, test sensitivity, and misclassification of the cause of death hamper the derivation of reliable estimates of pandemic mortality burden. Estimating all-cause excess mortality above an expected mortality baseline can provide a reliable picture of the overall mortality burden during a severe pandemic event. In this talk, we focus on our work estimating mortality impact of the 1918 influenza pandemic and the COVID-19 pandemic. We will present a comparative analysis of excess mortality patterns by age, cause of death, and variation at the county level in the state of Arizona as well as its impact on natality and stillbirth risk. In light of these findings, we reflect on the ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic Mexico, including a discussion of the public health implications of our findings.

Taylor Paskoff, University of Missouri, USA, presented on “Determinants of post-1918 influenza pandemic tuberculosis mortality in Newfoundland”. You can find the recordings here:

https://hioa365-my.sharepoint.com/:v:/g/personal/jara_oslomet_no/EU0Z4TsdCAtKrX7rZZpJ2VsB80AN_c6zq7wrZwR6woVdrA?e=iFQ5Dn

We are pleased to announce the planned schedule for the Fall 2021 PANSOC Webinar Series. For Zoom links to the webinars, please email jessicad@oslomet.no

19 August: Elizabeth Wrigley-Field (University of Minnesota) & Martin Eiermann (University of Berkeley): “Racial Disparities in Mortality During the 1918 Influenza Pandemic in United States Cities.”

2 September – SPECIAL TIME: 17:00-18:00 CET – PANSOC’s MSCA Candidates: 

9 September: Ida Milne, Carlow College: “Forgetting and Remembering the Great Flu: Collecting and Shaping Narratives.”

16 September: Mathias Mølbak Ingholt, Roskilde University, Denmark: “Occupational Characteristics and Spatial Differences During an Intermittent Fever Epidemic in Early 19th Century Denmark.”

23 September: Mary Sheehan, University of Melbourne: “Women and the Spanish Influenza Pandemic in Melbourne, Australia, in 1919.”

30 September: Howard Phillips, University of Cape Town: “The Silence of the Survivors. South Africans and the Memory of the Spanish Flu Pandemic of 1918.”

7 October: Guido Alfani, Bocconi University: “Unravelling the Mysteries of Seventeenth-Century Plagues: The Contribution of Micro-Demographic Approaches.”

14 October: Lianne Tripp, University of Northern British Columbia: “The 1918/19 Influenza: Hidden Heterogeneity in an Island Population.”

21 October: Amir Afkhami, The George Washington University: “From Cholera to COVID19: Continuity and Change in Iran’s Pandemic Experience.”

28 October: Hampton Gaddy, University of Oxford: “Re-estimating the global and national death tolls of the 1918-20 pandemic: Updating Johnson and Mueller (2002).”

11 November: Sharon DeWitte, University of South Carolina: “Social Inequality and Pandemic Mortality: The Biosocial Context of the 14th-Century Black Death.”

18 November: PANSOC’s Master’s Students:

2 December: Madeleine Mant, University of Toronto Mississauga: “Going Viral: COVID-19 and Risk in Young Adult Health Behaviour Models.”

9 December: Tamara Giles-Vernick, Institut Pasteur: “Complex local vulnerabilities and the COVID-19 pandemic in France.”

16 December: John Eicher, Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies and Pennsylvania State University – Altoona: “A Digital History Approach to Analyzing Memories of the 1918 Flu Pandemic.”

Taylor Paskoff, University of Missouri, USA, presents on “Determinants of post-1918 influenza pandemic tuberculosis mortality in Newfoundland”.

Send e-mail to masv@oslomet.no to get the zoom-link.

Blurb: In some places around the world, the severe impact of the 1918 influenza pandemic is considered to be the turning point for tuberculosis mortality, in that the former declined significantly after the pandemic due to possible selective effects. I investigate tuberculosis mortality trends on the island of Newfoundland for the first four decades of the 20^th century (1900-1939) to identify where, or if, a significant decline in tuberculosis mortality occurred that could have been associated with the 1918 influenza pandemic. These mortality patterns are discussed in terms of the historical context of the island, including cultural and behavioral determinants that may have overshadowed any pathogenic selective effects.

Professor Lisa Sattenspiel compared the 1918 influenza with COVID-19 in rural and urban areas of Missouri, USA:

https://hioa365-my.sharepoint.com/:v:/g/personal/jara_oslomet_no/ERK2QwiUcvNJnG9lcmGsu6sBUsVDb27nTvtnNR84aVQQYA?e=vJFrgb

Professor Lisa Sattenspiel, University of Missouri, USA, will present on “Comparing COVID and the 1918 flu in rural vs. urban counties of Missouri”.

If you wish to attend this Zoom-webinar, please send us an e-mail at: masv@oslomet.no

Blurb: Socioeconomic and demographic factors within communities strongly influence infectious disease patterns. I describe here how such factors affected the spread of the 1918 influenza and current COVID-19 pandemics in the state of Missouri, emphasizing the identification of attributes that may have differentially affected rural vs. urban populations. Results suggest that epidemic patterns were affected at both time periods by a combination of factors such as degree of rurality, distance from the major urban centers of Kansas City and St. Louis, availability of medical resources, and level of ethnic diversity.