Megan Murray | |
---|---|
Relatives | Christopher J. L. Murray (brother) |
Academic background | |
Education | Dartmouth College (BS) Harvard University (MD, MPH, DPH) |
Thesis | Methodological problems in the molecular epidemiology of tuberculosis (2000) |
Academic work | |
Institutions | Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health |
Megan Blanche Murray is an American epidemiologist and an infectious disease physician. She is the Ronda Stryker and William Johnston Professor of Global Health in the Department of Epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Murray was born to a New Zealand-born scientist father and grew up in Minnesota with three siblings,including Christopher J. L. Murray. [1] As her father was an internist and her mother was a microbiologist,the family moved to Niger for various charitable medical missions. [2]
After earning her undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College in 1980,Murray traveled to Thailand with the Intergovernmental Committee for Migration to conduct Tuberculosis (TB) screenings. [3] She later earned her medical degree from Harvard Medical School and her Master's (MPH) and Doctor of Public Health (DPH)[ dubious ] at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. [4] Murray simultaneously completed her residency at Massachusetts General Hospital while specialising in infectious diseases. [3]
Following her DPH,Murray joined the Department of Epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health as an Assistant professor. During the 2002–2004 SARS outbreak,she worked with Postdoctoral fellow Ted Cohen to develop a mathematical model that proved that a number of multidrug-resistant strains of tuberculosis can easily reproduce and spread. [5] She also worked with Marc Lipsitch to create a mathematical model to estimate the speed of SARS in China and how to effectively lower its transmission. [6] The following year,she sat on the Medical Advisory Committee on Avian Flu to "advise top University officials in real time about the medical aspects of the flu." [7]
In 2007,Murray co-published Transmission Dynamics and Control of Severe Acute Repiratory Syndrome in the peer-reviewed academic journal Science. They used data collected in Singapore to calculate how long it takes for the disease to spread from one individual to another. [8] Later,while working as a co-principal investigator in an international collaboration project using Whole genome sequencing,she concluded that Mycobacterium tuberculosis was directly linked to more than 50 deaths during a tuberculosis outbreak in KwaZulu-Natal,South Africa. [9]
The following year,Murray was appointed the Principal Investigator of a multidrug-resistant tuberculosis study to better understand the development and transmission of drug resistant tuberculosis. [10] She also worked with Sarah Fortune to identify how tuberculosis develops drug-resistance mutations. [2] In 2013,Murray and Maha Farhat led a group of researchers in adapting Phylogenetics to discover the drug-resistance genes in humans. Their research resulted in the discovery of 39 new genes associated with elevated drug resistance. [11] Two years later,Murray published a study she led in Peru on how transmissible multidrug-resistant tuberculosis was. Her research team received a grant from the National Institutes of Health and began gathering data in Peru by 2009. The group studied 25 districts in Lima and gathered information about which genetic strains are likely to be drug-resistant. The aim of the study was to use the collected data to improve diagnosis of drug-resistance in patients and discover risk factors. [12]
During the Western African Ebola virus epidemic,Murray co-published a research paper with Ann Miller titled ReEBOV Antigen Rapid Test kit for point-of-care and laboratory-based testing for Ebola virus disease:a field validation study in The Lancet. The aim of the study was to develop a more accurate test for diagnosing Ebola by using a finger stick to draw sample blood and apply it to a treated strip. The test took about 15 minutes to diagnose instead of numerous days. [13] Since 2015,she has sat on the editorial board for PLOS Medicine [14] and later the European Journal of Epidemiology. [15]
As a result of her research,Murray was appointed the inaugural Ronda Stryker and William Johnston Professor of Global Health at Harvard Medical School in May 2017. She was also named the director of research at the Brigham and Women's Division of Global Health Equity and at Partners In Health. [16] In this role,she led the first large-scale study on how the tuberculosis bacterium affects different individuals based on their genes. They concluded that "some of the risk for early disease progression is driven by several gene variants,at least one of which controls key immune functions." [17]
During the COVID-19 pandemic,Murray approached the Abundance Foundation with the theory that the BCG vaccine could protect people against the virus. [18]
Tuberculosis (TB),also known colloquially as the "white death",or historically as consumption,is an infectious disease usually caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs,but it can also affect other parts of the body. Most infections show no symptoms,in which case it is known as latent tuberculosis. Around 10% of latent infections progress to active disease which,if left untreated,kill about half of those affected. Typical symptoms of active TB are chronic cough with blood-containing mucus,fever,night sweats,and weight loss. Infection of other organs can cause a wide range of symptoms.
An epidemic is the rapid spread of disease to a large number of hosts in a given population within a short period of time. For example,in meningococcal infections,an attack rate in excess of 15 cases per 100,000 people for two consecutive weeks is considered an epidemic.
Tuberculosis managementdescribes the techniques and procedures utilized for treating tuberculosis (TB).
Partners In Health (PIH) is an international nonprofit public health organization founded in 1987 by Paul Farmer,Ophelia Dahl,Thomas J. White,Todd McCormack,and Jim Yong Kim.
TB Alliance is a not-for-profit product development partnership (PDP) dedicated to the discovery and development of new,faster-acting and affordable tuberculosis (TB) medicines. Since its inception in 2000,TB Alliance has worked to grow the field of available treatments for TB and now manages the largest pipeline of new TB drugs in history. It was founded in Cape Town,South Africa,and has since expanded. It is headquartered in New York City and has a regional office in Pretoria.
Globalization,the flow of information,goods,capital,and people across political and geographic boundaries,allows infectious diseases to rapidly spread around the world,while also allowing the alleviation of factors such as hunger and poverty,which are key determinants of global health. The spread of diseases across wide geographic scales has increased through history. Early diseases that spread from Asia to Europe were bubonic plague,influenza of various types,and similar infectious diseases.
Extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) is a form of tuberculosis caused by bacteria that are resistant to some of the most effective anti-TB drugs. XDR-TB strains have arisen after the mismanagement of individuals with multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB).
Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) is a form of tuberculosis (TB) infection caused by bacteria that are resistant to treatment with at least two of the most powerful first-line anti-TB medications (drugs):isoniazid and rifampin. Some forms of TB are also resistant to second-line medications,and are called extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB).
Bedaquiline,sold under the brand name Sirturo,is a medication used to treat active tuberculosis. Specifically,it is used to treat multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) along with other medications for tuberculosis. It is used by mouth.
Pretomanid is an antibiotic medication used for the treatment of multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis affecting the lungs. It is generally used together with bedaquiline and linezolid. It is taken by mouth.
Totally drug-resistant tuberculosis (TDR-TB) is a generic term for tuberculosis strains that are resistant to a wider range of drugs than strains classified as extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis. Extensively drug resistant tuberculosis is tuberculosis that is resistant to isoniazid and rifampicin,any fluoroquinolone,and any of the three second line injectable TB drugs. TDR-TB has been identified in three countries;India,Iran,and Italy. The term was first presented in 2006,in which it showed that TB was resistant to many second line drugs and possibly all the medicines used to treat the disease. Lack of testing made it unclear which drugs the TDR-TB were resistant to.
Tuberculosis in India is a major health problem,causing about 220,000 deaths every year. In 2020,the Indian government made statements to eliminate tuberculosis from the country by 2025 through its National TB Elimination Program. Interventions in this program include major investment in health care,providing supplemental nutrition credit through the Nikshay Poshan Yojana,organizing a national epidemiological survey for tuberculosis,and organizing a national campaign to tie together the Indian government and private health infrastructure for the goal of eliminating the disease.
Delamanid,sold under the brand name Deltyba,is a medication used to treat tuberculosis. Specifically it is used,along with other antituberculosis medications,for active multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. It is taken by mouth.
The Bill &Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute is a non-profit biotechnology organization founded with the aim of bringing technologies and strategies to bear on the main health problems of the poor in low-income countries. The Gates MRI was organized as a subsidiary of the Bill &Melinda Gates Foundation who funded it with a $273 million 4-year grant.
Sarah Merritt Fortune is an American immunologist. She is a Full Professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases in the Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Jaime Bayona García is a Peruvian physician who focuses on public health and he has become a specialist in studying the epidemiology of tuberculosis. He is also known for his case studies on HIV/AIDS in Peru and other developing countries. Dr. Bayona has also done work on how public health systems should improve,in terms of providing the best approach to help the sick that cannot afford health care.
Susan Swindells is an American AIDS researcher.
Lorna E. Thorpe is an American epidemiologist who is a professor and Director of the Division of Epidemiology at NYU Langone Health. She serves as Vice Chair of Strategy and Planning in the Department of Population Health and on the Board of the American College of Epidemiology.
India NAP Gail Houston Cassell is an American microbiologist whose research focuses on Mycoplasma species and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. She is vice president of TB drug development at the Infectious Disease Research Institute. In 1994 she was the president of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM).
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