A pandemic is an epidemic of an infectious disease that has a sudden increase in cases and spreads across a large region, for instance multiple continents or worldwide, affecting a substantial number of individuals. Widespread endemic diseases with a stable number of infected individuals such as recurrences of seasonal influenza are generally excluded as they occur simultaneously in large regions of the globe rather than being spread worldwide.
Sir Peter Karel, Baron Piot, is a Belgian-British microbiologist known for his research into Ebola and AIDS.
Male circumcision reduces the risk of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) transmission from HIV positive women to men in high risk populations.
The HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN) is a worldwide collaborative clinical trials network that brings together investigators, ethicists, community and other partners to develop and test the safety and efficacy of interventions designed to prevent the acquisition and transmission of HIV. HPTN studies evaluate new HIV prevention interventions and strategies in populations and geographical regions that bear a disproportionate burden of infection. The HPTN is committed to the highest ethical standards for its clinical trials and recognizes the importance of community engagement in all phases of the research process.
HPTN 052 is the name of a clinical trial conducted in nine countries which examined whether starting people living with HIV on antiretroviral therapy (ART) can reduce the chance that they will pass HIV on to their sexual partners who do not have HIV. The trial showed remarkable success in preventing HIV transmission and were so compelling that the study's Data and Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB) asked the research team to share the results with all study participants and offer ART to the control group before the study ended. As a result of the study there was increased consensus that treatment as prevention should be included as a public health strategy in lowering HIV infection. The trial was organized by the HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN) and its chief architect was Myron S. Cohen.
Treatment as prevention (TasP) is a concept in public health that promotes treatment as a way to prevent and reduce the likelihood of HIV illness, death and transmission from an infected individual to others. Expanding access to earlier HIV diagnosis and treatment as a means to address the global epidemic by preventing illness, death and transmission was first proposed in 2000 by Garnett et al. The term is often used to talk about treating people that are currently living with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) to prevent illness, death and transmission. Although some experts narrow this to only include preventing infections, treatment prevents illnesses such as tuberculosis and has been shown to prevent death. In relation to HIV, antiretroviral therapy (ART) is a three or more drug combination therapy that is used to decrease the viral load, or the measured amount of virus, in an infected individual. Such medications are used as a preventative for infected individuals to not only spread the HIV virus to their negative partners but also improve their current health to increase their lifespans. When taken correctly, ART is able to diminish the presence of the HIV virus in the bodily fluids of an infected person to a level of undetectability. Consistent adherence to an ARV regimen, monitoring, and testing are essential for continued confirmed viral suppression. Treatment as prevention rose to great prominence in 2011, as part of the HPTN 052 study, which shed light on the benefits of early treatment for HIV positive individuals.
David DuPuy Celentano is a noted epidemiologist and professor who has contributed significantly to the promotion of research on HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs). He is the Charles Armstrong chair of the Department of Epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He holds joint appointments with the school’s departments of Health Policy and Management, Health Behavior and Society, and International Health, and the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine’s Division of Infectious Diseases.
Soumya Swaminathan is an Indian paediatrician and clinical scientist known for her research on tuberculosis and HIV. From 2019 to 2022, she served as the chief scientist at the World Health Organization under the leadership of Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Previously, from October 2017 to March 2019, she was the Deputy Director General of Programmes (DDP) at the World Health Organization.
Terry M. McGovern is an American public health scholar. She is the Senior Associate Dean for Academic and Faculty Affairs at CUNY Graduate School of Public Health & Health Policy in New York City. McGovern is also Professor of Health Policy and Management.
Neil Morris Ferguson is a British epidemiologist and professor of mathematical biology, who specialises in the patterns of spread of infectious disease in humans and animals. He is the director of the Jameel Institute, and of the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis, and head of the Department of Infectious Disease Epidemiology in the School of Public Health and Vice-Dean for Academic Development in the Faculty of Medicine, all at Imperial College London.
Michael Joseph Ryan is an Irish epidemiologist and former trauma surgeon, specialising in infectious disease and public health. He is executive director of the World Health Organization's Health Emergencies Programme, leading the team responsible for the international containment and treatment of COVID-19. Ryan has held leadership positions and has worked on various outbreak response teams in the field to eradicate the spread of diseases including bacillary dysentery, cholera, Crimean–Congo hemorrhagic fever, Ebola, Marburg virus disease, measles, meningitis, relapsing fever, Rift Valley fever, SARS, and Shigellosis.
Caitlin M. Rivers is an American epidemiologist who as Senior Scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, specializing on improving epidemic preparedness. Rivers is currently working on the American response to the COVID-19 pandemic with a focus on the incorporation of infectious disease modeling and forecasting into public health decision making.
The Imperial College COVID-19 Response Team is a group of experts from Imperial College London studying the COVID-19 pandemic and informing the government of the United Kingdom, and governments and public health agencies around the world. The team comprises scientists from the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis, the Jameel Institute, the Imperial College Business School and the Department of Mathematics. The Imperial College COVID-19 Response Team is led by Professor Neil Ferguson, Director of the Jameel Institute and MRC GIDA.
Helen Ward is a British physician who is professor of public health at Imperial College London and director of the patient experience research centre. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Ward called for the Government of the United Kingdom to be more proactive in their response to the outbreak of SARS-CoV-2.
Kimberly A. Powers is an American epidemiologist who is an associate professor of epidemiology at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health. She combines epidemiology, statistics and mathematical modelling to understand the transmission of infectious diseases. In 2011 her work on antiretroviral therapy for the management of human immunodeficiency virus was selected by Science as the breakthrough of the year. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Powers looked to understand the spread of SARS-CoV-2.
Sarah Fidler is an immunologist, researcher and professor in HIV Medicine at Imperial College London and consultant physician in HIV for St Mary's Hospital, London.
The Abdul Latif Jameel Institute for Disease and Emergency Analytics is a research institute at Imperial College London in the fields of epidemiology, mathematical modelling of infectious diseases and emergencies, environmental health, and health economics. Co-founded in 2019 by Imperial College London and Community Jameel, the Jameel Institute is housed in the School of Public Health, within the college's Faculty of Medicine. The mission of the Jameel Institute is "to combat threats from disease worldwide".
Etheldreda Nakimuli-Mpungu is a professor, researcher, epidemiologist and psychiatrist at the Department of Psychiatry in the Faculty of Medicine, Makerere University in Uganda. Her research is particularly focused on supportive group psychotherapy as a first-line treatment for depression in people with HIV. She is one of only five recipients of the Elsevier Foundation Award for Early Career Women Scientists in the Developing World in Biological Sciences, as well as listed at one of the BBC's 100 Women in 2020.
Cheryl Cohen is a South African public health researcher who is a professor at the University of the Witwatersrand. She looks to develop evidence-based policy to reduce the burdens of respiratory diseases. During the COVID-19 pandemic. Cohen investigated the rates of COVID-19 in South Africa.
Suerie Moon is a Korean American public health expert who is Professor of Practice at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies. Her research considers global health, health equity and pandemic preparedness.
