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Rapid responses to health questions for fact-checkers and journalists.
There is no evidence that food or the packaging it comes in plays a role in COVID-19 transmission. The public health community is continually learning about how the novel coronavirus spreads, and what transmission routes are most likely to make it spread. Because of this continual learning in the public health community, there has been confusion around how easily COVID-19 spreads, through which routes, and what precautions are really necessary—such as wiping down grocery packaging. According to recent studies, the risk of becoming infected by surfaces like food and packaging is quite low, but the same prevention measures experts have been suggesting for months should still be followed. Health experts recommend hand washing after handling produce and putting away groceries, but not that people wipe down or disinfect the packaging or belongings before coming inside. They should instead use hand washing after bringing items inside and putting them away.
There is no evidence to suggest that the use of face masks increases the risk of developing pneumonia, or any other bacterial, fungal or viral infection in the lungs. In fact, according to a study published in the Preventive Medicine journal, wearing face masks is shown to protect people against bacterial infections in hospital settings, where health care workers are most prone to antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The American Lung Association also endorses the U.S. CDC recommendation of wearing masks in public. WHO and CDC both recommend that general sanitation guidelines should be followed to ensure one is wearing clean masks. Wet or visibly dirty masks should not be worn, as they can be contaminated with micro organisms.
Though vaccine efficacy and vaccine effectiveness are similar terms and are often used interchangeably, the differences between the two are important. In this entry, we rely on the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (U.S. CDC) definitions of effectiveness and efficacy. When a new vaccine is being developed and studied in clinical trials, scientists report on vaccine efficacy. Efficacy is a term used to describe how well the vaccine protects clinical trial participants from getting sick or getting very sick. The term does not describe how well a vaccine works on the general public. The efficacy of a vaccine reflects ideal circumstances, like a research trial, which are different than real-world conditions. Once a vaccine is made available for large population groups, vaccine effectiveness can be measured. Effectiveness is the amount of protection given by a vaccine in a certain population when its used under field conditions (somewhat normal practices, less than perfectly controlled like in a research study). It considers other factors like population-level differences in health status, weight, age, and other factors across communities. Effectiveness is a more reliable and accurate term for how helpful a vaccine is at preventing disease in daily life when people are doing regular community-based activities like socializing, going to work or school, and grocery shopping.
While scientists have hypothesized that COVID-19 came from snakes, pangolins, bats, and other creatures, we still don't know exactly which animal passed the virus to humans, or how many species it might have impacted along the way. Scientists have determined that the virus did come from animals, not humans, and was first traced to a wet market in Wuhan, China. Many countries are hoping an independent investigation will take place to determine when and how COVID-19 first entered the human population, and at exactly what location. Many experts believe that the virus is a "wild" one, meaning that one animal species transmitted the virus to another species before it was spread to humans. The only way to determine exactly which animal the virus came from is to find the original animal species in the wild.
Bro-Zedex is a cough syrup that is used to treat symptoms of a cough. There are Bro-Zedex formulas for both wet and dry coughs, and the ingredients in each type are different. For wet coughs, the key ingredient in the orange-colored Bro-Zedex is bromhexine, which is a medication that treats respiratory issues that cause excessive mucus and phlegm in the throat and mouth. Bromhexine does this by making the mucus in the throat thinner and easier to remove through coughing. This formula's other ingredients - menthol, guaifenesin, and terbutaline - can make the phlegm in your chest and throat thinner so it's easier to cough up, cool and soothe sore throats, and relax the muscles in your airways. For dry coughs, Bro-Zedex comes in a green liquid and its main ingredients are ambroxol, levosalbutamol, and guaifenesin. This formula loosens congestion in your chest and throat by breaking up phlegm and also relaxing the muscles in your airway so you can breathe easier. Though these formulas work in similar ways, their ingredients are meant to relieve specific symptoms that come with wet and dry coughs. Bro-Zedex is not used as a treatment for COVID-19 on its own, but may help relieve some of the uncomfortable symptoms that occur in mild to moderate cases of the infection, like coughing and phlegm build-up. Current research is looking at whether bromhexine can be taken for prevention - before a COVID-19 infection to prevent someone from getting sick, or as part of a treatment plan in more severe cases to help improve some symptoms. Bro-Zedex is also part of clinical trials where researchers are looking to see if it can shorten the amount of time a person has COVID-19 symptoms or help prevent hospitalized patients infected with COVID-19 from becoming infected with other respiratory illnesses while they are still in the hospital. _This entry was updated with new information on August 11, 2020._
The Covaxin vaccine is a vaccine developed by Bharat Biotech and uses an inactivated virus approach to help the body build an immune response against COVID-19. Inactivated viral vaccines have been used for over 100 years, including for polio, rabies and hepatitis A. In order to grow cells in laboratory settings for vaccine research, serum from calf or fetal blood is sometimes used. It helps cells grow and replicate so they can be studied. Covaxin has been reported to use calf serum as a building block in its vaccine development, according to journalists. Bharat Biotech—the maker of Covaxin—has yet to comment on whether the presence of calf serum is used in the vaccine itself, or just in the vaccine's development process According to Bharat BioTech, the Covaxin vaccine is made up of 6µg of whole-virion inactivated SARS-CoV-2 antigen (Strain: NIV-2020-770), and the other inactive ingredients such as aluminum hydroxide gel, TLR 7/8 agonist (imidazoquinolinone, TM 2-phenoxyethanol, and phosphate buffer saline.
COVID-19 is far more lethal than the virus that causes the common cold, even though the vast majority of COVID-19 patients only experience mild or no symptoms. The best available current evidence indicates that the novel coronavirus is easily transmissible in the absence of social distancing and mask wearing, and is responsible for more than 900,000 deaths globally. The common cold is generally not lethal, with some rare exceptions. The flu, which is deadlier than the common cold, killed 0.1% of the people who contracted it in 2019. It is still too early to discern accurate global death estimates for people who have contracted COVID-19, but estimates have ranged from 1% to 25% of all cases, depending on the country. Even conservative COVID-19 death rates (around 1% ) would mean that the novel coronavirus is at least 10 times as deadly as the flu, and significantly more lethal than the common cold. Compared to the common cold, COVID-19 kills more people in every age group, and is especially more lethal in the oldest age groups. However, it is important to note that actual case numbers and the ability to accurately attribute cause of deaths to COVID-19 is still evolving. As the pandemic progresses and scientists receive a complete picture of all known infections, the risk of death will become more clear.
The United States Food and Drug Administration (U.S. FDA) recently issued two Emergency Use Authorization (EUAs) for American pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly's most recent COVID-19 treatments. The first emergency use authorization was issued on November 19, 2020, for bamlanivimab, an antibody treatment. Bamlanivimab has been shown to reduce emergency room visits and hospitalizations in patients who receive the medication quickly after their diagnosis, according to early studies. No benefit has been shown in hospitalized patients with the virus. The treatment was developed with collaborators including Vancouver-based AbCellera and the U.S. National Institutes of Health. Bamlanivimab is a monoclonal antibody drug that mimics the immune system’s own antibodies that fight off harmful antigens such as viruses (like COVID-19). In this way, the medication might be able to help block the virus from entering and infecting healthy human cells. This drug should be dispensed as soon as possible after a person tests positive for the virus and within 10 days of developing systems. Bamlanivimab is authorized for people 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 40 kilograms (88 pounds) and who may be at risk for developing a severe case of COVID-19 infection or be hospitalized due to its impacts. Bamlanivimab was developed from the blood of a recovered patient who had developed antibodies to the virus. The data used to support this emergency use authorization was based on a phase two randomized clinical trial in 465 non-hospitalized adults with mild to moderate COVID-19 symptoms. Patients treated with bamlanivimab showed reduced viral load and rates of symptoms and hospitalization in comparison with those who did not receive the treatment. On November 19, 2020, (U.S. FDA) issued an EUA for the emergency use of Eli Lilly's drug baricitinib to be used in combination with another COVID-19 U.S. FDA-approved treatment, remdesivir, in adult patients who have been hospitalized with COVID-19. This treatment, which also goes by the brand name Olumiant, is normally used to treat rheumatoid arthritis and was developed in partnership with Incyte. In comparison to treating patients with remdesivir alone, baricitinib was shown to reduce time to recovery, when combined with the remdesivir. The safety of this investigational therapy is still being studied, but this medication combination was authorized for patients two years of age or older with suspected or confirmed cases of the virus who require supplemental oxygen, invasive mechanical ventilation, or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO). The combination of drugs improved patients' median time to recovery from eight to seven days compared to remdesivir alone, a 12.5% improvement in the 1,000 patient study that began on May 8,2020, to assess the efficacy and safety of baricitinib plus remdesivir versus remdesivir in hospitalized patients with COVID-19. The proportion of patients who progressed to ventilation, or died by day 29, was 23% lower when given both drugs in comparison to remdesivir alone. By day 29, deaths among patients were also reduced by 35% for the combination treatment when compared to remdesivir by itself. The recommended dose for baricitinib in COVID-19 patients is 4 milligrams once daily for 14 days or until hospital discharge.
Paracetamol (also known as acetaminophen, Tylenol, Dolo 650) can help relieve symptoms associated with COVID-19, but it cannot cure the viral infection. Paracetamol, also known as acetaminophen, is a medication commonly used for mild to moderate pain and aches relief, and fever reduction. Since some people infected with COVID-19 experience fever, body aches and headaches, this drug has been prescribed to relieve those symptoms. Paracetamol can provide some relief for patients with these symptoms, but it is not a cure against COVID-19. Paracetamol made news headlines early in the pandemic because some governments, including the United Kingdom and France, and the World Health Organization encouraged people with COVID-19 to take paracetamol rather than ibuprofen – another drug used to help manage symptoms like fever, headache, or body aches. At the time, there were concerns about a link between ibuprofen and other drugs that could be prescribed to COVID-19 patients (such as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory (NSAID) drugs) that could lead to an increased risk for illness or for worsening of COVID-19 symptoms. As the pandemic evolved, the WHO changed their stance on March 19 2020 to say that they do not recommend avoiding ibuprofen to treat COVID-19 symptoms. While paracetamol is routinely used to relieve COVID-19 symptoms, it is important to strictly respect the dosage prescribed as stated on the medication bottle. The dosage of paracetamol for adults is 1-2 500 milligram tablets up to four times in 24 hours, with at least four hours in between doses. Any higher amount can be dangerous and is not advised. _This entry was updated with new information on August 4th, 2020_
Thrombosis occurs when a clump of blood changes from a liquid form to a semi-solid form (called a 'blood clot' or 'thrombus'), and then becomes big enough to partially or fully block the regular flow of blood in veins or arteries. In some severe cases of COVID-19, thrombosis can happen, which prevents blood from flowing normally in patients (despite many of taking blood thinners meant to prevent blood clots from occurring). In some COVID-19 patients, thrombosis may contribute to causing respiratory (breathing) failure, kidney failure, heart attacks, strokes or other dangerous medical issues that can lead to death. Research studies have shown that thrombosis is a known complication of COVID-19 and is associated with an increased risk of death. More research is needed in this area to determine exactly **why** thrombosis may be occurring. Recent analyses show that many hospitalized patients with COVID-19 who developed thrombosis also developed pneumonia and other lung and respiratory problems. Some patients also developed damage to their blood vessels, while a significant number also developed pulmonary embolisms (blood clots in the lung). These other impacts must also be considered when studying and determining the cause of death related to COVID-19.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, feces of some patients who have been diagnosed with COVID-19 have been shown to carry the virus. This has caused many to question the safest way to use the toilet so as to prevent any COVID-19 infection from potentially spreading when the toilet is flushed. The reason many people are concerned about this topic is that it has been discovered that the virus leaves the human body through our waste, which is why it has been found in the feces of infected individuals. When we flush waste down the toilet, traces of the virus may linger in the air long enough to be inhaled. Studies have shown that during a toilet flush, particles can be transported more than 3 feet (1m) upward and can float in the air for more than a minute. It is unknown if the particles that linger in the air are infectious, and how many virus particles are needed to cause an infection. Since there are many unknowns, by precaution, public health experts recommend closing the lid before flushing and wearing masks inside public restrooms.
Pfizer-BioNTEch and Moderna have started working on booster doses for their vaccines because of concerns that current versions will be less effective against new, possibly more contagious, COVID-19 variants. Pfizer-BioNTEch and Moderna vaccines are made using mRNA, which is like a genetic software code that can be updated relatively easily and quickly. Tweaking the vaccine can be done in a couple of days, but updated vaccine trials might require more time. The FDA's testing process and policy for the new booster shots is not yet known, but is expected to be publicized soon. Some experts suggest that the end result may look similar to the FDA's process for the flu vaccine, which changes every year but does not go through full-scale clinical trial phases every time an adjustment is made. Viral mutations are a common phenomenon in infectious diseases. COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers report that their vaccines work against the mutations identified in the U.K. and South Africa, but their laboratory studies suggest that the vaccines are less effective against the variant identified in South Africa.
High levels of false negatives from RT-PCR testing and long waits to receive test results have led many medical institutions to use chest CT (computed tomography) scans to diagnose COVID-19. Several studies, mostly conducted in China, have shown higher sensitivity of CT scans in detecting coronavirus when a PCR test showed a negative result. However, this does not mean that CT scans alone should be used for disease identification. CT scans can also miss detecting the virus and be misidentified with other pulmonary infectious/ viral pneumonias. Some experts believe that CT scans do not add any diagnostic value, while others believe that from a population health perspective during a pandemic, CT scans should be used to isolate suspicious cases for COVID-19, because of its high sensitivity and rapid identification. Some studies support a dual approach of CT scans and RT-PCR, or the use of chest CT scan to screen for coronavirus when RT-PCR tests are negative. CT scans are relatively expensive compared to swab tests and also expose patients to a small dose of radiation. Some experts argue that because CT scans are resource intensive, they cannot be used as a population-wide testing tool. The American College of Radiology (ACR) and US CDC recommend against using Chest CT scanning for screening or diagnosis of coronavirus disease 2019. On the other hand, the National Health Commission of China has encouraged the use of Chest CT scans for diagnosis. Local resource constrains and expert physician advise on individual patient conditions are important factors in deciding on the use of CT scans or not.
Glycoproteins, which are a type of molecule made up of proteins and carbohydrates (like sugar), can be found in many viruses. They serve as a way to assist the viruses with entering and binding to the human body. Glycoproteins are found in viruses including SARS (SARS-CoV-1), chikungunya, dengue virus, hepatitis C, ebola, influenza, and more. HIV and COVID-19 have glycoproteins, including spike-like glycoproteins that push out from the virus's surface to attach to cells. However, both COVID-19 and HIV also have distinct genetic codes and different ways of infecting and impacting the people they infect. A recent retracted and debunked study implied that four pieces of genetic code in the COVID-19 virus have striking similarities to genetic sequences found in HIV strains from Thailand, Kenya and India. The research team noted that, similar to those HIV strains, some of the four pieces of code in COVID-19 were found on the spike part of a glycoprotein of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The debunked study suggested it was likely that scientists manually placed the four genetic chunks into COVID-19 samples from the HIV-1 genome, or in other words, that the virus was created in a laboratory. This study was taken down from its pre-print host site and has been widely debunked for numerous reasons. Though both COVID-19 and HIV have similar spike proteins, with surfaces that are covered by a coat of sugar molecules ( which is how the viruses latch onto and enter human cells) they are not unique to these two viruses by any means. The four DNA protein sequences that the study highlighted are found in many different organisms, including the ones that cause cryptosporidiosis and malaria, in addition to SARS-CoV-2 and HIV. Additionally, the sample of genetic code used in the study was so short and thus not unique, that the code could easily be found in a number of other viruses. A paper rejecting the original study's findings noted that, after a genetic analysis using a more detailed database of genetic sequencing codes, scientists found not just similarities between COVID-19 and HIV, but also at least 100 identical or highly similar codes in genes from mammals, insects, bacteria, and others and in a large number of viruses caused by many different reasons. The paper showed that the genetic codes were not essential for HIV's functions, as they were highly varied and could include many moderations, further disproving the link between HIV being a potential source for SARS-CoV-2's genetic code. Finally, the paper demonstrated that several of the four genetic code insertions were found in bats in 2013 and 2018, so they existed in nature before COVID-19 was even identified, let alone genetically sequenced. Though there are several similarities between HIV and COVID-19 including spike glycoproteins and some similar genetic codes, the scientific community has disproven the idea that genetic codes from HIV could have been altered and substituted into SARS-CoV-2 to cause the COVID-19 virus.
Clinical trial researchers have standard definitions for routinely detecting COVID-19 cases for both symptomatic and asymptomatic individuals. There are three ways that researchers classify and identify symptomatic COVID-19 cases in clinical trials. Criteria for the first classification includes: the presence of at least one COVID-19 symptom and a positive COVID-19 test during, or within 4 days before or after, having symptoms. The second classification is the same, but also includes four additional COVID-19 symptoms defined by the CDC (fatigue, headache, nasal congestion or runny nose, nausea). Criteria for the third classification, which identifies severe COVID-19 cases in clinical trials, includes a confirmed COVID-19 test (per the above guidelines), as well as one of the following symptoms: clinical signs of severe systemic illness, respiratory failure, evidence of shock, significant acute kidney, liver, or brain dysfunction, admission to an ICU, or death. The Pfizer research protocol states individuals who do not clinically present COVID-19 (that is, asymptomatic individuals) are tested for COVID-19 antibodies. A positive asymptomatic case is defined as the presence of antibodies in an individual who had a prior negative test. By using these four definitions, researchers are able to detect COVID-19 cases in both symptomatic and asymptomatic individuals. However, the pharmaceutical company has stated that there are more data on the vaccine’s safety and efficacy for symptomatic cases, and that more data is needed to better understand the vaccine’s safety and efficacy for asymptomatic cases.
Health Desk provides on-demand and on-deadline science information to users seeking to quickly communicate complex topics to audiences.
In-house scientists provide custom explainers for critical science questions from journalists, fact-checkers and others in need of accessible breakdowns on scientific information. Topics range from reproductive health, infectious disease, climate science, vaccinology or other health areas.
Meedan's Health-Desk.org makes every effort to provide health- and science-related information that is accurate and reflects the best evidence available at the time of publication. To submit an error or correction request, please email our editorial team at health@meedan.com. All error or correction requests will be reviewed by the Health Desk Editorial and Science Teams. Where there is evidence of a factual error or typo, we will update the explainer with a correction or clarification and follow up with the reader on the status of the request.
Our scientists, writers, journalists, and experts do not engage in, advocate for, or publicize their personal views on policy issues that might lead a reasonable member of the public to see our team’s work as biased. If you have concerns or comments about potential bias in our work, please contact our editorial team at health@meedan.com.
Health Desk provides on-demand and on-deadline science information to users seeking to quickly communicate complex topics to audiences.
In-house scientists provide custom explainers for critical science questions from journalists, fact-checkers and others in need of accessible breakdowns on scientific information. Topics range from reproductive health, infectious disease, climate science, vaccinology or other health areas.
Meedan's Health-Desk.org makes every effort to provide health- and science-related information that is accurate and reflects the best evidence available at the time of publication. To submit an error or correction request, please email our editorial team at health@meedan.com. All error or correction requests will be reviewed by the Health Desk Editorial and Science Teams. Where there is evidence of a factual error or typo, we will update the explainer with a correction or clarification and follow up with the reader on the status of the request.
Our scientists, writers, journalists, and experts do not engage in, advocate for, or publicize their personal views on policy issues that might lead a reasonable member of the public to see our team’s work as biased. If you have concerns or comments about potential bias in our work, please contact our editorial team at health@meedan.com.
Nat Gyenes, MPH, leads Meedan’s Digital Health Lab, an initiative dedicated to addressing health information equity challenges, with a focus on the role that technology plays in mediating access to health through access to information. She received her masters in public health from the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, with a focus on equitable access to health information and human rights. As a research affiliate at Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, she studies the ways in which health information sources and outputs can impact health outcomes. She lectures at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health on Health, Media and Human Rights. Before joining Meedan, Nat worked at the MIT Media Lab as a health misinformation researcher.
Megan Marrelli is a Peabody award-winning journalist and the News Lead of Health Desk. She focuses on news innovation in today’s complex information environment. Megan has worked on the digital breaking news desk of the Globe and Mail, Canada’s national newspaper, and on the news production team of the Netflix series Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj. She was a Canadian Association of Journalists finalist for a team Chronicle Herald investigation into house fires in Halifax, Nova Scotia. On top of her role at Meedan Megan works with the investigative journalism incubator Type Investigations, where she is reporting a data-driven story on fatal patient safety failures in U.S. hospitals. She holds a Master of Science from the Columbia Journalism School and lives in New York.
Anshu holds a Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and a Humanitarian Studies, Ethics, and Human Rights concentrator at the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative. She is a Harvard Voices in Leadership writing fellow and student moderator, Prajna Fellow, and the John C. and Katherine Vogelheim Hansen Fund for Africa Awardee. Anshu’s interests include: systemic issues of emergency management, crisis leadership, intersectoral approaches to climate risk resilience, inclusion and human rights, international development, access and sustainability of global health systems, and socio-economic equity. Anshu has worked at the United Nations, UNDP, UNICEF, Gates Foundation, and the Institute of Healthcare Improvement.
Dr. Christin Gilmer is a Global Health Scientist with a background in infectious diseases, international health systems, and population health and technology. In the last 15 years, Christin has worked for the WHO, University of Oxford, World Health Partners, USAID, UNFPA, the FXB Center for Health & Human Rights and more, including volunteering for Special Olympics International’s health programs and running health- and technology-based nonprofits across the country. She obtained her Doctor of Public Health Degree at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, her MPH at Columbia, and spent time studying at M.I.T., Harvard Kennedy School, and Harvard Business School. Christin has worked in dozens of countries across five continents and loves running programs and research internationally, but she is currently based in Seattle.
Dr. Jessica Huang is currently a COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fellow with the Harvard Kennedy School’s Bloomberg City Leadership Initiative. Previously, she worked and taught with D-Lab at MIT, leading poverty reduction and humanitarian innovation projects with UNICEF, UNHCR, Oxfam, USAID, foreign government ministries and community-based organizations across dozens of countries. She also co-founded a social enterprise that has provided access to safe drinking water to thousands in India, Nepal and Bangladesh. Formerly trained as an environmental engineer, she earned a Doctorate of Public Health from Harvard and a Master’s in Learning, Design and Technology (LDT) from Stanford. Her projects have won multiple awards, including the top prize in A Grand Challenge for Development: Technology to Support Education in Crisis & Conflict Settings, and led to her being recognized for Learning 30 Under 30. She enjoys being an active volunteer, supporting several non-profits in health, education, environmental sustainability and social justice.
Jenna Sherman, MPH, is a Program Manager for Meedan’s Digital Health Lab, an initiative focused on addressing the urgent challenges around health information equity. She has her MPH from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in Social and Behavioral Sciences, with a concentration in Maternal and Child Health. Prior to her graduate studies, Jenna served as a Senior Project Coordinator at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, where she worked on tech ethics with an emphasis on mitigating bias and discrimination in AI and health misinformation online. Previous experiences include helping to develop accessible drug pricing policies, researching access to quality information during epidemics, and studying the impact of maternal incarceration on infant health.
Nour is a Global Health Strategy consultant based in Dakar (Senegal) and specialized in health system strengthening. Most recently, she worked with Dalberg Advisors focusing on Epidemic Preparedness & Response and Vaccination Coverage and Equity across 15 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. Her previous work experiences include researching the clinical needs in point-of-care technology in cancer care at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston; and coordinating the implementation of a colonoscopy quality assurance initiative for a colorectal cancer screening program at McGill University in Montreal. Nour has a Master of Public Health from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, a Master of Arts in Medical Ethics and Law from King’s College London, and a Bachelor of Science from McGill University. She is fluent in French and English.
Shalini Joshi is a Program Lead at Meedan and formerly the Executive Editor and co-founder of Khabar Lahariya - India’s only independent, digital news network available to viewers in remote rural areas and small towns. Shalini transformed Khabar Lahariya from one edition of a printed newspaper to an award-winning digital news agency available to over ten million viewers. She has a sophisticated understanding of local media and gender, and the ways in which they can inhibit women from participating in the public sphere in South Asia. Shalini was a TruthBuzz Partner & Fellow with the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ). She is a trainer in journalism, verification and fact-checking. She has designed, implemented and strengthened news reporting & editorial policies and practices in newsrooms and fact-checking organisations. Shalini set up and managed the tipline used to collect WhatsApp-based rumors for Checkpoint, a research project to study misinformation at scale during the 2019 Indian general elections.
Mohit Nair currently serves as Partnerships Director at FairVote Washington, a non-profit organisation based in Seattle, WA. Previously, he worked with the Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) Vienna Evaluation Unit and with MSF Operational Centre Barcelona in India. He has conducted research studies on diverse topics, including the drivers of antibiotic resistance in West Bengal and perceptions of palliative care in Bihar. Mohit has also worked as a research consultant with Save the Children in Laos to identify gaps in the primary health system and develop a district-wide action plan for children with disabilities. He holds a Master of Public Health from the Harvard University T.H. Chan School of Public Health and a Bachelor of Science from Cornell University.
Seema Yasmin is an Emmy Award-winning medical journalist, poet, physican and author. Yasmin served as an officer in the Epidemic Intelligence Service at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention where she investigated disease outbreaks. She trained in journalism at the University of Toronto and in medicine at the University of Cambridge. Yasmin was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in breaking news in 2017 with a team from The Dallas Morning News and received an Emmy Award for her reporting on neglected diseases. She received two grants from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and was selected as a John S. Knight Fellow in Journalism at Stanford University iin 2017 where she investigated the spread of health misinformation and disinformation during epidemics.
Dr. Saskia Popescu is an infectious disease epidemiologist and infection preventionist with a focus on hospital biopreparedness and the role of infection prevention in health security efforts. She is an expert in healthcare biopreparedness and is nationally recognized for her work in infection prevention and enhancing hospital response to infectious diseases events. Currently, Dr. Popescu is an Adjunct Professor with the University of Arizona, and an Affiliate Faculty with George Mason University, while serving on the Coronavirus Task Force within the Federation of American Scientists, and on a data collection subcommittee for SARS-CoV-2 response with the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine. She holds a PhD in Biodefense from George Mason University, a Masters in Public Health with a focus on infectious diseases, and a Masters of Arts in International Security Studies, from the University of Arizona. Dr. Popescu is an Alumni Fellow of the Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Initiative (ELBI) at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Center for Health Security. She is also an external expert for the European Centre for Disease Control (ECDC), and a recipient of the Presidential Scholarship at George Mason University. In 2010, she was a recipient of the Frontier Interdisciplinary eXperience (FIX) HS-STEM Career Development Grant in Food Defense through the National Center for Food Protection and Defense. During her work as an infection preventionist, she managed Ebola response, a 300+ measles exposure resulting in an MMWR article, and bioterrorism preparedness in the hospital system. More recently, she created and disseminated a gap analysis for a 6-hospital system to establish vulnerabilities for high-consequence diseases, helping to guide the creation of a high-consequence disease initiative to enhance readiness at the healthcare level.
Ben Kertman is a behavior change scientist and public health specialist who became a user research consultant to help organizations design experiences that change behaviors and improve human well-being. Impatient with the tendency of behavior change companies to use a single discipline approach (e.g. behavioral economics) and guard their methods behind paywalls, Ben spent the last 7 years developing an open-source, multi-discipline, behavior change framework for researchers and designers to apply to UX. Ben is an in-house SME at Fidelity Investments and consults for non-profits on the side. Ben holds a masters in Social and Behavior Science and Public Health from Harvard.
Emily LaRose is a Registered Dietitian and Nutrition and Global Health Consultant who, in addition to her work with Meedan, currently works as a Technical Advisor for Nutrition for Operation Smile. She has been a dietitian for more than 18 years and, over the past 10 years, she has worked for the World Bank, Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN), Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), PATH, Johnson & Wales University, and Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. In her work, she has conducted analytical research and written specialty reports on infant and young child malnutrition, health misinformation, global human milk banking practices, and innovative food system programs; developed tools and protocols for clinical nutrition care delivery in humanitarian hospitals; taught university-level nutrition courses; and provided nutritional care for critically ill hospitalized patients. Emily earned her Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) degree with a Nutrition and Global Health Concentration at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, her Master of Science in Dietetics at Kansas State University, and her Bachelor of Science in Culinary Arts Nutrition at Johnson & Wales University.
Bhargav Krishna is a Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research in Delhi, and adjunct faculty at the Public Health Foundation of India and Azim Premji University. He previously managed the Centre for Environmental Health at the Public Health Foundation of India, leading research and teaching on environmental health at the Foundation. He has been a member of Government of India expert committees on air pollution and biomedical waste, and has led work with Union and State governments on air pollution, climate change, and health systems. His work has been funded by the World Health Organization, Rockefeller Foundation, Packard Foundation, Environmental Defense Fund, and others. He holds bachelors and masters degrees in Biotechnology and Environmental Science respectively, and graduated recently from the Doctor of Public Health program at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health. Bhargav also co-founded Care for Air, a non-profit working on raising awareness related to air pollution with school children in Delhi.
Dr. Christine Mutaganzwa is a medical doctor pursuing a Ph.D. program at the Université de Montréal in Biomedical Sciences. She holds a Master of Medical Sciences in Global Health Delivery (MMSc-GHD) from Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, and a Master of Sciences (MSc) in Epidemiology and Biostatistics from the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. She graduated from the University of Rwanda with a degree in General Medicine and Surgery. Christine has worked with referral hospitals in Kigali, the capital city of Rwanda, during her medical training and after graduation. In addition, she has extensive experience working with rural communities in the Eastern province of Rwanda, where she organized clinical and research activities in active collaboration with colleagues within and outside Rwanda. Her research portfolio cuts across maternal and child health to infectious and chronic diseases. Christine is an advocate for children's healthcare services, especially for underserved populations. She is part of a community of scientists translating scientific findings into understandable and accessible information for the general population. Christine is an avid reader and a lover of classical/contemporary music.
Ahmad is an experienced physician, who earned his medical degree from Cairo University, Faculty of Medicine, in Egypt. He practiced medicine between 2012 and 2017 as a general practitioner where he was involved in primary care, health quarantine services, and radiology. He then taught medicine in Cairo for two years prior to starting his MPH program, at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, where he supplemented his experience with knowledge on epidemiology, health systems and global health issues. Additionally, Ahmad has an interest in nutrition, which started as a personal curiosity to how he can improve his own health, then quickly saw the potential for public health nutrition in the prevention and management of multiple, lifelong diseases. His enrollment at Harvard started his transition towards learning about food, and public health nutrition. Ahmad now combines the knowledge and experience of his medical career, with the learnings of his degree to navigate public health topics in his writing and his career. He is a life-long learner and continues to gather knowledge and experience, and works towards maximizing his impact through combatting misinformation through his work with Meedan.
Dr. Uzma Alam is a global health professional working at the intersection of infectious diseases and healthcare delivery in the international development and humanitarian contexts. She focuses on the use of evidence and innovation to inform strategies and policies. Her work has appeared globally across print and media outlets.She has international experience with roles of increasing responsibility across the science value chain having served with academic, non-profit, corporate, and governmental agencies, including advisory commissions and corporate counsel. Uzma is the former secretary of the Association of Women in Science and editor of the Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law, and Ethics. Currently she serves on the Board of the Geneva Foundation. She also leads the Biomedical and Health Sciences Portfolio of the Developing Excellence, Leadership and Training in Science in Africa program (DELTAS-Africa). A US$100 million programme supporting development of world-class scientific leaders on the continent. Plus heading the African Science, Technology, and Innovation (STI) Priorities Programme. A programme that engages Africa’s science and political leaders to identify the top STI priorities for the continent that if addressed, offer the highest return on investment for Africa’s sustainable development.
