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Amin Colominas/ Contributing Writer
news@fiusm.com
University experts are scheduled to come together for a panel to discuss the past year’s Ebola pandemic.
“The Ebola Epidemic: Public Health, Medical and Social Perspectives” will be hosted by the Robert Stempel College of Public Health and Social Work.
Erica L. Gollub, Dr.P.H., M.P.H., the moderator for the panel, outlined the goals of the event as being “to educate and raise awareness, to update people, and to encourage people to evaluate and analyze and understand current public health challenges.”
The ultimate purpose of the event is to make it readily apparent that the Ebola epidemic is no longer solely a medical or African problem.
The disease has entered the realm of a global and social issue that requires the world to examine the outbreak in a professional and organized fashion in order to prevent future epidemics.
“If we fail to learn the lessons–and there’s lots of lessons–if we fail to learn and implement new things, then we put ourselves at risk very easily for something like [Ebola] to happen again,” Gollub said. “The ground is fertile for another outbreak like this to get out of control if we don’t learn the lessons now.”
The panel will feature some of the foremost researchers in the field.
Among them are Dr.Aileen Marty, and Dr.Consuelo Beck-Sagué, who will be returning to the United States from West Africa just days before the event.
Marty, of the Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine, will be speaking on her experience working for the World Health Organization (WHO) on the ground in West Africa, providing first hand knowledge of the medical situation in many different countries.
Beck-Sagué, of the FIU Robert Stempel College of Public Health and Social Work, will be addressing issues about safety and transmissions among health care settings in West Africa
She will also weigh in on the preparedness of the United States and other countries when faced with such an epidemic.
Other experts will also be present.
Dr. Zena Stein, a world renowned epidemiologist, will be speaking on her editorial in the International Journal of Epidemiology about containing the Ebola epidemic, mobilizing the survivors of the disease, and the glaring health disparities found throughout Africa.
Stein will be visiting the University for two weeks, giving the inaugural Robert Stempel Honorary Lecture in Epidemiology on Tuesday, Feb. 10.
In order to discuss what the world has learned as a result of the Ebola outbreak in terms of quarantine policies–when and where is quarantine appropriate, and what implications for future public health crises have arisen–Dr. Mary Jo Trepka, from the Robert Stempel College of Public Health and Social Work will speak.
Gollub hopes for a large turnout.
“I think that everybody, wherever they’re coming from in the audience, will be able to relate to some part of this story because it’s a very human story,” she said.
She admits that the discussion will not be entirely technical, acknowledging the fact that it deals with medical issues.
“It’s an extremely human story about caring, devoting resources, carrying through, and management.”
The event will take place on Friday, Feb. 6, from 11:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. in the Wertheim Conservatory Room 130 at the Modesto A. Maidique Campus.
The panel is open to alumni, faculty, students and the community. A light lunch will be provided as well as one continuing education unit (CEU) available. Those interested in attending should register at go.fiu.edu/epiebolapanel.
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