New paper out: Indigenous peoples & Pandemics

masv on 12. May 2022

Photo: Orphans after the “Spanish” flu pandemic in Nushagak, Alaska, summer of 1919. Source: Alaska Historical Library

In this new paper in Scandinavian Journal of Public health, titled Indigenous peoples and pandemics – Daniele E. Alves, Svenn-Erik Mamelund, Jessica Dimka, Lone Simonsen, Mathias Mølbak, Søren Ørskov, Lisa Sattenspiel, Lianne Tripp, Andrew Noymer, Gerardo Chowell-Puente, Sushma Dahal, Taylor P. Van Doren, Amanda Wissler, Courtney Heffernan, Kirsty Renfree Short, Heather Battles, Michael G. Baker, 2022 (sagepub.com), we have done a review of the literature on Indigenous vs. non-Indigenous disparities in mortality during the 1918 and 2009 influenza pandemics as well as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

The paper concludes that there there were large disparities in mortality in 1918 and in 2009. However, there are simply not enough high quality data, which makes it difficult to investigate whether Indigenous peoples have a larger COVID-19 mortality risk than non-Indigenous persons.

This paper is the first of several collaborative papers that will come out of the 2022-2023 CAS-project titled Social Science Meets Biology: Indigenous People and Severe Influenza Outcomes – CAS and led by PANSOC leader Mamelund

Next webinar (12 May, 1600 CET)

masv on 10. May 2022

Carolyn Orbann, University of Missouri, will present “Co-circulating respiratory diseases at the end of the 1918 influenza pandemic.”

The 2020-2021 flu season was among the lowest on record, largely due to the wide circulation of COVID-19 and the measures in place for pandemic control. In this talk, I will present evidence on a variety of respiratory diseases circulating in the US state of Missouri during the 1918 flu pandemic. We will discuss how mortality rates from diseases that typically cause predictable mortality were impacted by the influenza pandemic and how we might understand those changes using a syndemic framework.

Carolyn Orbann is Associate Teaching Professor of Health Sciences at the University of Missouri – Columbia. Her current research interests include infectious disease in historic human populations and the impact of culture on disease spread. She uses historic data, including primary and secondary sources, to understand epidemics in the past, primarily 1918 flu and diseases of colonization in 18th century California. She uses computer simulation models to test ideas about the impact of human culture on infectious disease dynamics. 

Contact jessicad@oslomet.no for a Zoom link.

Next Webinar 5 May

masv on 29. April 2022

On 5 May at 1600 CET, Vibeke Narverud Nyborg, University of South-Eastern Norway and PANSOC, will present Different approaches to Public Health Legislation as means in fighting the influenza pandemic 1918 to 1920.

In the decades prior to the outbreak of the influenza pandemic in 1918, Norway had a significant development and focus on public health, including national health legislation and organizing the administration of public health. These legislations were based on international development of medicine, understanding disease and infection, and preventive measures in addition to national uniqueness. Despite this, disagreement and different local solutions to the major health threat caused by the pandemic seem to characterize the use of national legislation as a driving force in fighting the influenza pandemic in Norway. In this presentation I focus on different approaches to explore and understand how national legislation was used, and within what framework local authorities based their decision in trying to fight the influenza pandemic between 1918 and 1920.

Vibeke Narverud Nyborg is Associate Professor in the History of Medicine and Health at University of South-Eastern Norway (USN). Since August 2021, she has been Associate Professor II at PANSOC, working with historical pandemics, focusing specifically on the 1918 flu and national legislation. She has a PhD from USN from 2020 where she focused on conceptual meaning making in historical education of doctors and nurses. For further information, please see her profile on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vibeke-narverud-nyborg-33b04183/

Contact jessicad@oslomet.no for a Zoom link.

PANSOC’s research cited in the new report from the Norwegian Corona-commission

masv on 27. April 2022

Nushagak, Alaska, summer of 1919. The picture is from one of several orphanages that popped up in Alaska after the terrible “Spanish flu” pandemic had killed a high number of parents and younger siblings leaving only a handful of children aged 5-14 in the most severely hit villages.
Source: Alaska Historical Library.

The Norwegian Corona-commission is citing PANSOC’S research on Indigenous peoples & Pandemics, including an opinion piece by Centre leader Mameund in Aftenposten 15 April 2020 (Urfolk vil trolig bli hardest rammet av koronapandemien | Svenn-Erik Mamelund (aftenposten.no) and a recently published journal article in the prestigious journal Population Studies by Mamelund and co-head of PANSOC, Jessica Dimka (New paper out: Pandemics are not great equalizers – Centre for Research on Pandemics & Society (PANSOC) (oslomet.no)).

Our research is cited in chapter 10, page 409. You can read the whole report here. NOU 2022: 5 (regjeringen.no)

From 15th of August 2022 to 30th of June 2023, Centre leader Mamelund will lead an interdisciplinary and international research group at Centre for Advance study (CAS). The title of the research project is Social Science Meets Biology: Indigenous People and Severe Influenza Outcomes – CAS

Dr. Kaspar Staub guest researcher at PANSOC in May

masv on 24. April 2022

In week 20 (16-19 May), PANSOC will host Kaspar Staub | LinkedIn (Dr. PhD and head of Institute of evolutionary medicine, University of Zürich) as a guest researcher. We will discuss ongoing and future research collaborations, and Dr. Staub will among other things, also give a public lecture at OsloMet University library on May 18th from 11:30-12:00. You can read more here: (3) Excess mortality during past and present pandemics | Facebook

Next webinar April 21

masv on 13. April 2022

The next PANSOC webinar will be on April 21 at 1600. Jord Hanus, University of Antwerp, will present “Socioeconomic Status and Epidemic Mortality in an Urban Environment (Mechelen, Belgium): Were Dysentery (1794) and Cholera (1866) Socially Neutral Diseases?”

In this paper, we present some of the first results of the http://www.epibel.be project on Epidemics and Inequality in Belgium, investigating socio-economic gradients in (epidemic) mortality for the mid-sized town of Mechelen (or Malines). We study the social profiles of the victims of two large outbreaks (dysentery in 1794 and cholera in 1866) in comparison with regular mortality in an attempt to map the ‘epidemic mortality premium’. This analysis connects various strands of literature, pushing our understanding of the health gradient further back in time as well as providing a detailed long-term understanding of an early-modern urban mortality regime, both in times of (epidemiological) crisis and in demographically less eventful periods.

Jord’s bio: “Since September 2021 I work as postdoc researcher on the EPIBEL project (www.epibel.be), which allows me to combine my passion for the study of inequalities in economic and social development with a very topical theme: the societal impact of epidemics. Before, I wrote a PhD (2006-2010) and worked as postdoc (2010-2013) on economic growth and inequality in the early modern Low Countries. Until 2021 I then served as Head of the Research Affairs Office of the UAntwerp’s Dept. of Research Affairs & Innovation (ADOC).”

Contact jessicad@oslomet.no for a link.