Category: Pandemics & Society Seminars

For the third Pandemics & Society Seminar of our Spring 2025 series we are pleased to welcome Jessica Stockdale (Simon Fraser University). The seminar will be held on Thursday, 20 March at the normal time (1600 CET). More information about our speaker and the presentation is below. You can sign up for email notifications about the seminar series, including the Zoom details, here.

Abstract

Genomic epidemiology has become a critical part of the infectious disease toolbox, that sheds light on the effects of pathogen evolution on transmission. While genomic tools are now routinely used to track the emergence of novel pathogens and strains, their use in forecasting and efforts to model drivers of local transmission is still developing. In this talk, I will present a statistical modelling framework that forecasts the size of an upcoming COVID-19 wave, such as that driven by a new variant. This framework combines diverse global data, including COVID-19 genomic sequences and epidemiological, clinical and demographic features. We are able to assess which predictors were more or less influential on wave size, and how this varied during the pandemic. Focusing on the Omicron BA.1 and BA.2 waves, we found that local genomic landscapes and demographic features were impactful on wave sizes around the world, and the importance of predictors changed markedly between waves, reflecting ongoing changes in underlying epidemiology and our public health response.

About the Speaker

Dr. Jessica Stockdale is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mathematics at Simon Fraser University and a member of the Pacific Institute on Pathogens, Pandemics and Society. Her research uses approaches in mathematical and statistical modelling to address challenges in public health, with a focus on infectious disease. Currently, her work spans the development of methods in genomic epidemiology to predict patterns of disease transmission, to applied healthcare modelling supporting response to homelessness and housing insecurity.

For the second Pandemics & Society Seminar of our Spring 2025 series we are pleased to welcome Vitalie Stirba (Charles University). The seminar will be held on Thursday, 13 March at the normal time (1600 CET). More information about our speaker and the presentation is below. You can sign up for email notifications about the seminar series, including the Zoom details, here.

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic revealed a visible discrepancy in mortality levels between countries, regions, and populations depending on their socioeconomic and demographic characteristics. Scientific literature denotes the influence of individual, behavioural and institutional factors on COVID-19 outcomes, including risk of death. Additionally, state institutions seemed to have a crucial influence on COVID-19 mortality depending on their capacity to respond timely to population health challenges by reducing the risk of death and unnecessary disease sequelae. This research is conducted based on a hypothesis that people respond to the COVID-19 crisis depending on the information available in their usually spoken language, which ultimately leads to a discrepancy in COVID-19 mortality between the populations by ethnicity and mother and usually language spoken. Thus, by employing a linear regression model, we compared the level of COVID-19 mortality among the main ethnicities in Moldova. Our results revealed a significantly higher mortality level in the Russian-speaking population. We speculatively explain our results as the effect of COVID-19 propaganda in Russian media, which led to a higher hesitancy in vaccination with western-made vaccines against COVID-19, but also by a higher institutional mistrust among the ethnic minorities in Moldova and a lack of institutional capacity to communicate efficiently with the ethnic minorities. The results could serve the central and local authorities in implementing targeted health policies to diminish health inequalities among populations by socioeconomic and ethnolinguistic characteristics.

About the Speaker

Vitalie Stirba is a PhD candidate at Charles University in Prague and a researcher at at the Centre for Demographic Research in Chisinau. He is a demographer with a focus on mortality and population health, and he is part a team elaborating population forecasts for Moldovan central authorities.

For the first Pandemics & Society Seminar of our Spring 2025 series we are pleased to welcome Alex Brown (Durham University). The seminar will be held on Thursday, 20 February at the normal time (1600 CET). More information about our speaker and the presentation is below. You can sign up for email notifications about the seminar series, including the Zoom details, here.

Abstract

This talk introduces our new Leverhulme-funded project: ‘Modelling the Black Death and Social Connectivity in Medieval England’. The Black Death of 1348–9 stands ‘unchallenged as the greatest disaster in documented human history’, yet the characteristics of the disease that killed approximately half the population of Europe in just a handful of years have long confounded academics. Although largely thought to be caused by Yersinia pestis, it is still unclear how the disease spread so quickly in a preindustrial society. We will introduce our project which hopes to use the latest computer modelling developed in response to the COVID-19 outbreak to simulate the spread of the Black Death in England. Using historical and archaeological sources, we will reconstruct the broad characteristics of the late medieval population on the eve of the Black Death, such as their location, age, sex, and occupation. This is the ‘static’ part of our model. We will then infer their ‘dynamic’ behavioural patterns, such as where they spent their time and whom they encountered in their daily lives. Our primary objectives are to establish how the Black Death spread, the likely means of its transmission, and what this reveals about social connections in medieval society. 

About the Speaker

Dr Alex Brown is an Associate Professor of Medieval History at Durham University and is currently the Principal Investigator on the Leverhulme-funded research project, ‘Modelling the Black Death and Social Connectivity in Medieval England’. He has published widely on the economic and social history of late medieval England. 

For the final Pandemics & Society Seminar of our Fall 2024 series we are pleased to welcome Srijita Pal (University of Southern California). The seminar will be held on Thursday, 5 December at the normal time (1600 CET). More information about our speaker and the presentation is below. You can sign up for email notifications about the seminar series, including the Zoom details, here.

Abstract

The first wave of the 1918 influenza pandemic occurred during a crucial moment in the First World War, yet despite this temporal overlap, their interactions remain underexplored by military and medical historians alike. This presentation, however, focuses on the unique challenges that were created when soldiers faced two enemies—war and disease—at once, contending that the first wave of the pandemic crucially impacted the war. Looking at the months of May through July of 1918, this presentation will put forward the argument that the timing of the first wave of the flu, alongside a fundamental misunderstanding of the disease fatally debilitated the German Army during the Kaiserschlacht, or Spring Offensive, all while passing over the better medically equipped French Army months before during a time in which they faced no major offensives. Then focusing primarily on the experiences of the German Sixth Armeeoberkommando, this presentation will look at how the disease affected soldiers in a way that directly impacted the tactical and operational pursuits of the German Army during Operation Marneschütz-Reims, contributing to the ultimate failure of the operation and, subsequently, contributing to the failure of the Spring Offensive. Drawing from years of extensive archival work, this presentation showcases historical evidence that places the influenza pandemic and the First World War not just as parallel historical events, but intertwined global catastrophes that changed the trajectory of twentieth century Europe.

About the Speaker

Srijita Pal is a doctoral candidate in the Department of History at the University of Southern California where she studies modern European history and the history of science and medicine. In addition to holding bachelor’s degrees in both Microbiology and History from the University of California, Davis, she additionally holds a master’s degree in World History from New York University.

For the penultimate Pandemics & Society Seminar of our Fall 2024 series we are pleased to welcome Isaac Fung (Georgia Southern University). The seminar will be held on Thursday, 21 November at the normal time (1600 CET). More information about our speaker and the presentation is below. You can sign up for email notifications about the seminar series, including the Zoom details, here.

Abstract

Background: After the Zero COVID policy ended on December 7, 2022, ~90% of the mainland Chinese population were infected in a COVID-19 wave. This systematic review synthesized research estimating excess mortality during that wave in mainland China. 

Methods: We searched seven bibliographic databases with specified keywords on May 9 and 16, 2024. Peer-reviewed research articles in Chinese or English, published since January 1, 2023, estimating excess deaths at the population level due to the COVID-19 wave following the end of the Zero COVID policy were included. Risk of bias was assessed using a modified Newcastle Ottawa Scale. Two authors independently conducted abstract screening, full-text review, data extraction and risk-of-bias assessment. We estimated all-cause mortality in mainland China by extrapolating Shanghai data with age-standardization.

Results: Seven articles were included. Two analyses of Shanghai’s death records of a town and a district estimated the respective excess mortality rates of 153.60% and 174.33%. Extrapolating the district’s data to the whole mainland China, we estimated the all-cause mortality to be 4.96 million, of which 3.14 million would be excess deaths. Using indirect methods, four studies estimated national excess mortality, ranging from 0.71 million to 1.87 million. Another study estimated excess mortality in Taiyuan. 

Conclusions: Studies using indirect methods provided national all-cause mortality estimates lower than estimates extrapolated from a Shanghai district’s death records. Choice of reference period, seasonality, and other factors affect expected mortality estimation. Excess mortality is the difference between actual and expected mortality; uncertainties in the latter two result in uncertainty in the former.

About the Speaker

Isaac Chun-Hai Fung, PhD, is an associate professor of epidemiology in the Jiann-Ping Hsu College of Public Health, Georgia Southern University. His current research interests include COVID-19 epidemiology, pandemic preparedness and emergency response. He has published 100+ publications in peer-reviewed journals. He was a CDC Prevention Effectiveness Fellow in 2011-2013 in which he was part of the 2013 avian influenza H7N9 emergency response. Since joining Georgia Southern University in 2013, Fung has helped create its Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) epidemiology program. Fung’s group has graduated 3 DrPH epidemiology students so far: the first doctoral student now works for the CDC; the second one proceeded to Harvard for postdoc and now works in the industry; the third one is currently a postdoc at the University of Kentucky.

For the seventh Pandemics & Society Seminar of our Fall 2024 series we are pleased to welcome Paul Skäbe (Universität Leipzig). The seminar will be held on Thursday, 14 November at the normal time (1600 CET). More information about our speaker and the presentation is below. You can sign up for email notifications about the seminar series, including the Zoom details, here.

Abstract

Historical discussions of African Americans’ experience of the 1918 influenza pandemic frequently revolve around the epidemiological data that emerged from this event. A persistent historical narrative has been that Black Americans fared relatively better compared to white Americans – a narrative that is as surprising as it is counterintuitive, since racialized segregation and consistent discrimination in medical care produced truly dismal health indicators during the early 20th century. Throughout the pandemic years, a multitude of medical studies appeared in the most prominent scientific journals of the time which would not only shape contemporary understandings of the not-yet-identified virus, but also pattern influenza knowledge for years to come. Significantly, these epidemiological discourses centrally revolved around questions of racialized difference. In my presentation, I will try to grapple with the epidemiological data and share my perspective as cultural historian on it, arguing that we are dealing with fundamentally racialized epidemiologies,organized by a black/white taxonomy of race. They largely emerged from racially segregated military base camps, considered by contemporary researchers as ideal laboratory conditions to study the human body and disease, but have also had a lasting effect on the historical understanding of the 1918 pandemic.

About the Speaker

Paul Skäbe is a research fellow at the LeipzigLab “Global Health” and the Research Center Global Dynamics (both Leipzig University),where he is currently working on his dissertation with the title “Responsibilization, Racialized Space, and the Great Influenza Pandemic in the United States.” His project focuses on Black Americans’ history during the pandemic, investigating the confluence of racialized discourses and epidemiology, the work of Black health care professionals in pandemic relief,and the daily lived experience of Black Americans at the intersection of segregation and public health. The PhD project is part of the DFG-funded research project “Pandemic Space: Understanding Quarantine and Responsibilization in Times of Corona.”