Channel - BCCDC GRAND ROUNDS SERIES
11/19/2025 12:45:55 AM
Channel Videos
Christopher Boyd - Moving Public Health Agencies from Reactive to Preventative Approaches for Managing Water Borne Disease Risks From Building Water Systems
Christopher Boyd is the General Manager for Building Water Health with NSF Health Sciences and has over 30 years’ experience working with elected officials, NGOs, community based organization and the private sector to advance progressive environmental, public health, sustainability and economic solutions. With NSF, Mr. Boyd works with public and private sector stakeholders to adopt best practices for managing distribution and premise plumbing systems. Prior to coming to NSF, Mr. Boyd was the Assistant Commissioner for Environmental Sciences and Engineering at the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, where he led the agency’s response to the largest Legionella outbreak in New York City history. He also reorganized the response to building and community legionella outbreaks and oversaw implementation of the first proactive Legionella controlling regulatory standards for cooling towers. Mr. Boyd was responsible for regulatory oversight of the city’s municipal water system, recreational waters, radiation producing equipment, radioactive materials and supported emergency preparedness efforts. Mr. Boyd developed a consensus building model to dramatically reduce the radiological terror risk profile of NYC and this model is being replicated by the U.S. National Nuclear Safety Administration in the U.S. and internationally. While with NYC, Mr. Boyd managed a team of over 100 personnel, including engineers, research scientists, medical physicists, water ecologists and public health sanitarians.
BC CDC Presenters
10/28/2019 7:00:00 PM
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Health inequities and incarceration: A public health perspective
Presenter: Dr. Stuart Kinner is Professor of Health Equity at Curtin University, Head of the Justice Health Unit at University of Melbourne and Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, and an Adjunct Professor in the Griffith Criminology Institute. For the past two decades Stuart’s research has focussed on health services and health outcomes for people who come into contact with the criminal justice system. He Chairs Australia’s National Youth Justice Health Advisory Group, and serves on both the WHO Health in Prisons Programme (WHO-HIPP) Steering Group, and the Worldwide Prison Health Research and Engagement Network (WEPHREN) Steering Committee. Summary: People who experience incarceration are distinguished by complex health needs. Incarceration is a setting through which vulnerable and marginalised members of the community pass. Health outcomes after incarceration are predictably poor, including elevated rates of death, due to a variety of preventable causes, in both adults and children. Although there is some evidence that incarceration is health depleting, it is also clear that most people who experience incarceration have significant pre-existing, typically under-served, health-related needs. As such, although reducing incarceration is important from a human rights perspective and *may* confer some health benefits, decarceration is not, per se, sufficient to improve the typically poor health outcomes seen in people who experience incarceration. Therefore, high quality healthcare in custody is important to reducing health inequalities, yet healthcare in custody is often inadequate. Investment in measurable custodial healthcare standards, routine monitoring of custodial healthcare, independent research and evaluation in custodial settings, and coordination between custodial and community healthcare will likely yield health, justice, and economic benefits.
BC CDC Presenters
10/18/2022 7:00:00 PM
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The Burden of Proof Risk Function: A new approach to evaluate health risk
Presenter: Dr. Michael Brauer is a Professor in the School of Population and Public Health at The University of British Columbia and a Principal Research Scientist and Affiliate Professor at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, where he leads the Environmental, Occupational and Dietary Risk Factors team for the Global Burden of Disease. His research focuses on linkages between the built environment and human health, with specific interest in the global health impacts of air pollution, the relationships between multiple exposures mediated by urban form and population health, and health impacts of a changing climate. Summary: Assessing strength and quantifying risk-outcome relationships is critical for public health prioritization, policy formulation, clinical guidance and to inform personal choices related to modifiable risk factors. While meta-analyses or meta-regressions are often used as an inputs, their use in decision making is often subjective. We introduce the quantitative burden of proof risk function in the context of the Global Burden of Disease comparative risk assessment framework. The burden of proof risk function combines meta-regression mean relationship between exposure and risk with unexplained between-study heterogeneity, adjusted for number of studies. We developed and applied a Bayesian meta regression framework to robustly estimate the mean and burden of proof risk function, allowing for non-linear relationships, and applied this to 197 behavioral, metabolic and environmental risk factor – outcome relationships. Relationships were summarized by a ‘star-rating’ where 1-star risks had a probability of no association after accounting for between-study heterogeneity, and 2, 3, 4, and 5-star risks indicated a 0-15%, 15-50%, 50-85% and 85% increase in risk, respectively, over the 15%-85% percentiles of exposures of included studies. The burden of proof risk function is a cautious interpretation of evidence, incorporating both magnitude and uncertainty in relative risks. Higher risk scores indicate a larger effect and/or a lower probability of results driven by residual confounding or other bias. Risk-outcome pairs with low star ratings indicating substantial between-study heterogeneity may suggest a need for additional studies, especially where exposure and outcome prevalence are high.
BC CDC Presenters
12/13/2022 8:00:00 PM
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Utilizing genomic data for reconstructing tuberculosis transmission: advances and challenges
Establishing patterns of tuberculosis (TB) transmission - who infected whom - is critical for controlling ongoing outbreaks and informing future strategies to eliminate the disease. However, reconstructing transmission networks of infections caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB)​can be difficult due to a highly variable latency period in which within-host evolution can occur and the clonal nature of MTB, particularly in low-incidence regions. Here, I present an overview of the current strategies being used to exploit genomic variation to resolve transmission networks, and introduce work that we are doing at the BCCDC to understand TB transmission dynamics in BC. Bio: Dr. Sobkowiak is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at BCCDC working on developing risk prediction models for TB transmission in BC through the application of bioinformatics and machine learning to genomic, epidemiological and healthcare data. He completed his PhD in Computational Biology in 2017 under Prof. Francois Balloux at University College London, UK and undertook his first postdoctoral position with Prof. Taane Clark at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK, investigating TB transmission dynamics and associated risk factors in Malawi.
BC CDC Presenters
2/18/2020 8:00:00 PM
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ACE2 – from discovery to the centre of a pandemic
Presenter: Dr. Josef Penninger is a world-renowned geneticist and the Canada 150 Research Chair in Functional Genetics. Dr. Penninger is currently the Director of the Life Sciences Institute (LSI) at the University of British Columbia. His major accomplishments include pioneering insights into the molecular basis of osteoporosis and breast cancer, and demonstrating a critical role for ACE2 as the cellular receptor for the SARS Coronavirus infections and linking ACE2 to lung failure in such infections. Summary: My group developed the first ACE2 mutant mice which we initially identified studying fly heart development (Crackower et al. Nature 2002). We then developed ICUs for lung failure in mice which allowed us to show that ACE2 is the essential SARS receptor in vivo (Kuba et a. Nature Medicine) and that ACE2 protects from lung injury providing a molecular explanation why SARS-CoV and now SARS-CoV2 become lethal diseases (as compared to other Coronaviruses giving us the common cold) (Imai et al. Nature 2005). Over the years we also showed that ACE2 protects multiple tissues such as the heart, lung, kidney, or blood vessels from more serious disease and that ACE2 is also expressed in the kidney and the luminal surface of the gut epithelium (e.g. Danilczyk et al. Nature 2006, Hashimoto et al. Nature 2012, etc). Therefore, our previous work has provided critical insights and a blueprint for the current COVID-19 pandemic. I will discuss how this knowledge is being translated to clinical trials in severe COVID-19 patients.
BC CDC Presenters
11/17/2020 8:00:00 PM
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Addressing COVID-19 Vaccine concerns AmoNg people who are incarCeratEd Study (ADVANCE)
Summary: People who experience incarceration are more negatively impacted by COVID-19, and are less likely to accept vaccination than the general population (in BC). This has been attributed to a lack of trust among people who experience incarceration. Public Health Orders and operational mandates in Corrections and Social Services (such as housing) have worsened distrust as further restrictions are imposed on people. To address distrust and promote vaccine confidence, the ADVANCE Study aims to co-develop peer-to-peer education strategies with people who are incarcerated. This Integrated Knowledge Translation (IKT) of emergent design uses Participatory Health Research (PHR) methods to engage those most impacted by the issues in setting strategic priorities. In this way, we anticipate that we will (1) establish foundational approaches to PHR and IKT with people who are incarcerated, (2) improve understanding of knowledge mobilization at the intersections of healthcare and carceral systems, and (3) address an urgent healthcare issue while identifying pathways toward addressing persistent health and justice inequities. Presenters: Sofia Bartlett (she/her) is the Senior Scientist, STIBBIs at BCCDC, and a Primary Investigator of the ADVANCE Study. Julia Santana Parrilla (she/her) is the ADVANCE Study Research Coordinator. Taylor Teal (they/them) is a learning designer and facilitator with the ADVANCE Study.
BC CDC Presenters
3/29/2022 7:00:00 PM
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Advancing equity in hepatitis C care with people who inject drugs: Recent qualitative research findings
People who inject drugs are inequitably impacted by hepatitis C and also face significant barriers to healthcare access, including for hepatitis C treatment. In this talk, UBC PhD student Trevor Goodyear will discuss recent qualitative research findings about people who inject drugs’ experiences with the implementation of novel hepatitis C treatments in British Columbia. This presentation will cover several aspects of hepatitis C care with this group, including socio-structural barriers to treatment access, clinician approaches to care, and expectations versus lived experiences of health following hepatitis C cure. Trevor will also outline policy, programmatic, and clinical strategies for improving hepatitis C care and more generally advancing health equity with people who inject drugs. Presenter: Trevor Goodyear (he/him) is a registered nurse and PhD student in the School of Nursing at UBC. He recently completed master’s degrees in public health and nursing, where his thesis explored opportunities for improving hepatitis C treatment and care with people who inject drugs and who live in BC. This thesis was nested within Dr. Rod Knight’s program of research at the BC Centre on Substance Use, with whom Trevor remains an affiliated trainee.
BC CDC Presenters
10/5/2021 7:00:00 PM
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Applications of genomic epidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 in BC.
Presenters: Dr. Linda Hoang is a physician and the associate director and program head of the Bacteriology & Mycology Lab at BCCDC. She is also a clinical associate professor in the Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine at UBC. Dr. Natalie Prystajecky is the program head for the Environmental Microbiology program at the BCCDC Public Health Laboratory. She is also a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine at UBC. Summary: The investment into WGS and genomics experiences over the past years at the BCCDC PHL has allowed for a rapid ramp up to implementing WGS as part of the pandemic response. WGS has proven to be an invaluable tool for cluster detection, outbreak response and surveillance of infectious diseases, and certainly the case for the COVID-19 pandemic response. Here we describe BCCDC PHL' s experience, building on existing genomics foundations, to allow for a transitioning from WGS as a research tool, to implementation for routine public health response. .
BC CDC Presenters
11/3/2020 8:00:00 PM
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Catalyzing upstream mental health promotion and prevention through the development of the Youth Development Instrument
Summary: Mental illness and substance use disorders (MSUDs) create a substantial health and economic burden in Canada, with one in two Canadians experiencing an MSUD by age 40 and an estimated $51 billion in costs yearly. An estimated 75% of MSUDs have their genesis before the age of 25 years, affecting 7.5 million Canadian children and youth. Social and emotional learning (SEL) and positive childhood experiences like supportive family relationships, community belonging, and coping skills, as well as structural supports like improving access to care, are protective and can avert or delay mental illness onset and/or severity. Yet 95% of health system funding is dedicated to specialized, hospital-based or downstream services, creating compelling potential for early intervention and prevention programming. Today’s Grand Rounds describes how the Youth Development Instrument (YDI), a survey of youth mental health and well-being among BC Grade 11 students, will inform strategies to reduce mental illness incidence. The YDI builds on existing BC child development data collected for over 400,000 children at age 5, 9 and 12 years by the Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP-UBC), creating a longitudinal cohort by linking student data. Cohort data will be linked with health services data to identify modifiable factors predicting mental illness. Inter-ministerial and intersectoral YDI advisory boards representing education, social work, public health and health services with central leadership from young people themselves guide project delivery and translation of findings into practice. Bios: Dr. Hasina Samji an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University and a Senior Scientist at the BC Centre for Disease Control. She has a PhD in Infectious Disease Epidemiology (Johns Hopkins) and studies how synergistic epidemics, or “syndemics,” of illnesses like HIV, HCV, and mental illness and substance use disorder interacting with contextual factors like poverty and early life trauma can create mutually reinforcing clusters of epidemics among populations, resulting in poorer access to healthcare and outcomes. Dr. Samji leads the Youth Development Instrument (YDI), an interdisciplinary study measuring predictors of positive youth well-being, mental health, and development in high school students in collaboration with the Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP-UBC), community, clinical and policy partners, and youth themselves. The YDI will elucidate upstream skill-development and structural supports for STBBI prevention. She is also the co-PI of a study in partnership with Anxiety Canada to measure the mental health impacts of the COVID-19: https://www.bcchr.ca/POP/our-research/pics Dr. Martin Guhn is Associate Professor at the Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP), School of Population and Public Health, UBC, and member of the Canadian Council on the Social Determinants of Health. He has a PhD in Human Development (UBC), conducted a Michael Smith Foundation of Health Research postdoctoral fellowship in Population Health at HELP, and has a master’s degree in Psychology and a bachelor degree in Music. His interdisciplinary, applied research focuses on social, cultural, demographic, and socio-economic determinants of children’s and adolescents’ developmental health, wellbeing, and educational trajectories. This research draws from population-level data linkages, and the EDI, MDI, TDI, CHEQ, and YDI research projects. Further research interests include children’s social and emotional development, bio-ecological theories of human development, and validation of population-level assessment. A primary goal of this research is to contribute to policy decision making and community-based knowledge mobilization that helps all children thrive.
BC CDC Presenters
3/2/2021 8:00:00 PM
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CDC Grand Rounds - Exploring host-directed Therapeutic Targets for Mycobacterium Tuberculosis - Dr Shannon Russell
New perspectives from South Africa
VCH Presenter, Vancouver Coastal Health Presentation
9/24/2019 7:00:00 PM
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Chronic Disease Surveillance at BCCDC
The goal of the presentation is to provide an overview of available information and tools as well as to highlight key projects completed or under way. Dr. Kate Smolina will introduce current resources available both publically and internally on data and statistics relating to chronic disease in BC, including Chronic Disease Dashboard, Cancer Dashboard, and a new CCHS Dashboard. Dr. Kate Smolina is the director of the BC Observatory for Population & Public Health, a partnership between the BC Ministry of Health and all BC health authorities to advance non-communicable disease, injury, and risk and protective factor surveillance in BC. Dr. Smolina holds a BSc in Bio-Medical Science from the University of Guelph and a DPhil in Public Health from the University of Oxford. Her professional career has been largely focused on chronic disease surveillance, linked administrate data, and health policy. 2. Dr. Drona Rasali: Indicators of Multimorbidity for Chronic Disease Surveillance Multimorbidity is becoming increasingly a key public health and primary care issue and is a complex underlying risk factor for COVID-19 case severity. A BCCDC team conducted a scoping review of the chronic disease multimorbidities for exploring the development of a multimorbidity indicator. I present briefly the development of an indicator comprising two or more conditions out of BC Chronic Disease Registries (CDR) is now being made available for surveillance through BCCDC Chronic Disease Dashboard. Dr. Drona Rasali, is the Director of Population Health Surveillance and Epidemiology working in the area Population and Public Health at BCCDC, PHSA since 2012. Prior to joining the PHSA, Dr. Rasali was the Provincial Chronic Disease Epidemiologist in the Saskatchewan Ministry of Health from 2005 to 2012. He holds a designation of a Fellow of American College of Epidemiology (FACE) and is an adjunct professor at the UBC School of Population and Public Health. He earned his Doctorate degree from the University of Manitoba, specializing in quantitative genetic analyses using animal models and epidemiologic analyses. He has more than 150 peer reviewed journal papers, government reports and technical reports to his credits in wide ranging fields including chronic disease epidemiology, public health, population genetics, veterinary medicine, agriculture, food, social justice, and general interest.
BC CDC Presenters
3/9/2021 8:00:00 PM
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COVID-19 Vaccine Update: Safety, Immunity and Variants
Summary: We will review current safety data from use of COVID-19 vaccines, and highlight ongoing safety surveillance and research in BC and across Canada. Immune responses to COVID-19 vaccines will be discussed and implications for vaccine effectiveness. We will discuss Understanding how variants of SARS-V-2 can affect vaccine effectiveness. Presenters: Dr. Manish Sadarangani is Director of the Vaccine Evaluation Center at the BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute and an Associate Professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases, UBC Department of Pediatrics. He has worked in pediatrics throughout the world, including in sub-Saharan Africa, Asia, Australia, North America and Europe. His research links clinical trials with basic microbiology, immunology and epidemiology to address clinically relevant problems related to immunization and vaccine-preventable diseases. Dr. Julie Bettinger, PhD, MPH, is a Professor at the Vaccine Evaluation Center in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of British Columbia. She is an infectious disease epidemiologist whose research interests include vaccine safety and vaccine preventable diseases, as well as attitudes and beliefs around immunization uptake and use. She is the data center director for the Canadian Immunization Monitoring Program, Active (IMPACT), an active surveillance network for vaccine preventable diseases and vaccine adverse events in 12 tertiary care pediatric hospitals across Canada and the principal investigator for CIRN’s Canadian National Vaccine Safety (CANVAS) network, which monitors the safety of influenza vaccines each year and is monitoring COVID vaccines. Dr. Agatha Jassem, PhD, D(ABMM), FCCM, is a Clinical Microbiologist and the Program Head of the Virology/Molecular Diagnostics Lab at the BC Centre for Disease Control Public Health Laboratory. She is also a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine at UBC. Dr. Jassem oversees diagnostic testing and her research focuses on evaluating new molecular- and serology-based strategies for virus detection/exposure.
BC CDC Presenters
4/27/2021 7:00:00 PM
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Covid-19: Guidelines for Testing and Interpretation. MAY 26 2020
Dr. Linda Hoang is a physician and the associate director and program head of the Bacteriology & Mycology Lab at BCCDC, as well as a clinical associate professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at UBC. Dr. Victor Yuen is a resident physician now graduating in Medical Microbiology from UBC. His primary research interests are molecular diagnostics, microbiology laboratory quality improvement, and public health clinical epidemiology.​
Mediasite Presenter
5/26/2020 5:00:00 PM
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COVID19: Treating disease, and figuring out what works
Presenter: Srinivas Murthy is Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of British Columbia. His research focuses on clinical trial design and implementation across populations around the world for severe and emerging infections. For COVID19, he serves on a number of government and public health advisory capacities, and is principal investigator of two multi-national clinical trials. Summary: This talk will focus on the current therapeutics landscape for COVID19, and where things are headed in the coming months.
BC CDC Presenters
10/27/2020 7:00:00 PM
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COVID19: Treating disease, and figuring out what works. Redux.
Summary: This talk will focus on the current therapeutics landscape for COVID19, and where things are headed in the coming months. Presenter: Dr. Srinivas Murthy is Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of British Columbia. His research focuses on clinical trial design and implementation across populations around the world for severe and emerging infections. For COVID-19, he serves on a number of government and public health advisory capacities, and is principal investigator of two multi-national clinical trials.
BC CDC Presenters
5/4/2021 7:00:00 PM
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Cumulative environmental, community and health impacts of multiple land uses and climate change in BC and beyond
Presenter: Dr. Chris Buse is an Assistant Professor with the Faculty of Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University with a focus on environmental health inequities. Dr. Buse’s integrative research program has two areas of overlapping focus: the health impacts of climate change and the public health response, and the cumulative impacts of natural resource extraction on environments, communities and health. Summary: Cumulative impacts refer to overlapping and persistent legacies of environmental change on ecosystems, communities and population health over time. While once primarily within the sole purview of impact assessment practitioners assessing major projects (e.g. dams, smelters, transmission lines), there is now growing recognition that cumulative environmental impacts of multiple land uses and climate change drive broader societal changes with implications for the health of individuals and communities. In light of this expanding discourse, new methodologies are required to quantify the totality of impact across social-ecological systems to support local and regional sustainability goals. Drawing from three regional case studies (Alberta Foothills, Northern Ontario, and British Columbia), this presentation presents an overview of a novel cumulative effects screening tool capable of merging environmental, socioeconomic and health data into a singular assessment architecture to quantify cumulative impacts across time and space. Opportunities and limitations associated with the tool’s utilization will be discussed, as well as future research opportunities to help better understand the relationship between cumulative environmental change and corresponding implications for communities and human health.
Mediasite Presenter
3/7/2023 8:00:00 PM
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Current issues in polio eradication in BC and beyond
In this talk, the presenters will: • Describe current policy issues in the BC polio immunization and surveillance programs and risks highlighted by the recent NYS case • Describe the current processes and challenges of laboratory diagnostic testing and surveillance strategies • Describe the current issues for the polio eradication “endgame”, including update on the status of polio eradication and challenges related to achieving eradication as per the Polio Eradication Strategy 2022-2026: Delivering on a promise Presenters: Dr. Monika Naus is the Medical Director of the Immunization Programs & Vaccine Preventable Diseases Service at BC Centre for Disease Control and Professor in the University of British Columbia School of Population and Public Health. Her public health career focus has been in communicable diseases, with a further focus in immunization and vaccine preventable diseases. She has served as member and as chair of the Canadian National Advisory Committee on Immunization, Canadian Immunization Committee, and various other groups. She is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Canada and of the American College of Preventive Medicine. Dr. Agatha Jassem is a Clinical Microbiologist and the Program Head of the Virology Lab at the BC Centre for Disease Control Public Health Laboratory. She is also a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Jassem oversees diagnostic testing and her research focuses on evaluating new strategies for detecting and charactering viruses and viral exposures. Dr. Arlene King is an internationally recognized expert in public health, immunization, communicable disease prevention and control, pandemic and emergency preparedness. She is an Adjunct Professor at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto, medical specialist in public health and preventive medicine and is an advisor and consultant in public health and preventive medicine. At a global level, she has served as the Chair of Regional Certification Commission (RCC) for the Polio Endgame in the Region of the Americas/PAHO since 2014 and is a member of the WHO Global Commission for the Certification of Polio Eradication (GCC). She also is Chair of the GCC [Poliovirus] Containment Working Group (CWG), member of the WHO African Region Certification Commission for Polio Eradication (ARCC) and member of the Technical Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization for the Americas/PAHO. In Canada, during the COVID-19 pandemic, she served as the Executive Medical Director, COVID-19 Immunization Strategy, Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), and as a Medical Health Officer, Fraser Regional Health Authority, British Columbia (BC) in support of the regional pandemic emergency response. Dr. King led Ontario’s public health sector as the Chief Medical Officer of Health (CMOH) from 2009 to 2014.
Mediasite Presenter
6/27/2023 7:00:00 PM
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Defining the Scope of Digital Public Health and its Implications for Practice and Research
Summary: “Digital Public Health” has emerged as a way describe the integration of digital technologies in public health functions to maximize public health impact. Despite keen interest in digital public health, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, its definition, scope, and inherent challenges are yet not clearly defined. We conducted a scoping review to clarify current conceptions of digital public health, its scope, inherent challenges and potential strategies to surmount these challenges. In this session, we present findings from our review of the literature, highlighting their implications for ongoing research and practice. Presenter: Ihoghosa (Muyi) Iyamu is a PhD Candidate at the School of Population and Public Health (SPPH), UBC and conducts his doctoral research with the online sexual health services team, Clinical prevention services - BCCDC.
BC CDC Presenters
5/10/2022 7:00:00 PM
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EMED Study: Increasing Access to Buprenorphine/Naloxone Microdosing and Standard Dosing in Emergency Departments
Summary: People at risk for overdose commonly present to emergency departments (EDs), however opportunities to engage them in ongoing care are often missed. Buprenorphine/naloxone (Suboxone) prevents mortality and is effective at engaging people in care when initiated in EDs. However, barriers exist to its initiation, including the need to be in moderate to severe withdrawal during induction, and the risk of precipitating withdrawal if started too early. Microdosing is a novel method that avoids withdrawal by starting small doses that increase gradually. The EMED study is a multicentre randomized controlled trial that is the first to test the effectiveness of microdosing versus standard dosing in retaining patients on Suboxone and other opioid agonist therapies. Early study implementation has overcome many challenges of implementing a RCT in the fast-paced ED setting. Bio: Dr. Jessica Moe is an emergency physician at Vancouver General and BC Children’s hospitals, and an Assistant professor in Substance Use and Addictions with the UBC Department of Emergency Medicine. She holds a Masters in Clinical Epidemiology and is a Clinician Scientist with the BC Centre for Disease Control. Her research interests lie in improving ED identification of people at risk for overdose, decreasing barriers to harm reduction interventions and treatments, and understanding people with frequent ED presentations. She is currently leading a multicentre randomized controlled trial evaluating buprenorphine/naloxone microdosing and standard dosing in the ED, as well as a study implementing and evaluating continuous pulse oximetry for people who smoke drugs at overdose prevention sites in BC.
BC CDC Presenters
1/11/2022 8:00:00 PM
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Groundwater and the Fate of Humanity
Summary: It is well known that humanity faces a crisis with climate change however there is a second more urgent crisis that humanity is facing. This crisis is freshwater and since groundwater is 99% of all freshwaters it is essentially a groundwater crisis. Of the 17 Sustainability goals formed by the UN, 8 are groundwater dependent. These goals are to be met in 2030. In 2010 the UN passed an additional resolution that safe drinking water is a human right however more than 3 billion people do not yet have access to safe drinking water and sanitation. The second part of the freshwater crisis concerns depletion of aquifers for irrigation. Approximately, 40% of agriculture in the globalized food system comes from irrigation and 70% of this irrigation water is groundwater. We have reached peak global water use at a time when the population is set to increase by another billion people and aquifers are being depleted, many beyond recovery in human time. Hence, we have a global food crisis looming that is dependent upon many factors for which availability of irrigation water will ultimately be a determinant. The third part of the freshwater crisis is contamination. Most groundwater has anthropogenic chemicals, and this is increasing, the health effects are unknown because of the combinations of contaminants. All countries will be impacted by the freshwater crisis, but the impacts will depend very much on the particular region. Policies should be directed at growing more local food. In Canada, 30% of the population relies on well water, mostly rural families, and small communities. This includes 52% percent of our First Nations population which rely on groundwater. Groundwater is responsive to drought and increased rainfall both of which can be problematic. Climate change and continuing contamination is going to increase the impacts on this population. To address this monitoring needs to be increased, well designs need to be modified to be more protective and this segment of the Canadian population needs to become much better informed of the water supply with increased interactions with government organizations. The Groundwater Project has been set up to make these problems better understood including communications with the lay public. Reducing anthropogenic greenhouse gases is of course necessary but this will take decades and the outcomes will be determined over a much longer time span than the outcomes for the water crisis. If the water crisis does not become a global priority the threat of societal collapse becomes large and therefore the prospects for reducing anthropogenic greenhouse gases become nil. Presenters: Dr. John Cherry’s research pioneered the field of groundwater pollution, now known as ‘contaminant hydrogeology’. He co-authored the book Groundwater with R.A. Freeze (1979) and was awarded the Lee Kuan Yew Water Prize (Singapore) in 2016 followed by the Stockholm Water Prize in 2020. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, a Foreign Member of the US National Academy of Engineering and on retirement from the University of Waterloo in 2006 became a Distinguished Emeritus Professor. He is a principal investigator at the Morwick G360 Institute for Groundwater Research at the University of Guelph, Canada. During 2017, he founded and is the leader of The Groundwater Project ([www.gw-project.org]www.gw-project.org), a global philanthropic project aimed at raising groundwater consciousness and strengthening groundwater expertise worldwide, in addition to making groundwater knowledge accessible for everyone everywhere. __________________________________________________________________________________________
Mediasite Presenter
6/13/2023 7:00:00 PM
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Host Mediator Modulation in COVID-19
Summary: I review the clinical features of acute COVID-19 briefly before illustrating the clinical stages of COVID-19. The stages of COVID-19 matter A LOT because therapies are optimized according to patient stage. The early pre-clinical stage is the arena for primary prevention by behaviours and use of vaccination. The early viral stage is managed with anti-virals and antibodies. Some have recently suggested a role for anti-inflammatory agents early, but this is uncertain. The later hospitalization stage is when anti-inflammatory and immune modulators appear to play a role. I then review important host mediators in COVID-19, the classes of host mediators and the strategies for mitigating some of the aberrant host-mediated responses to COVID-19. I choose several classes of mediators and review prominent trials of host mediators, prominent for efficacy and prominent for design features. I present an update on our BC-grown international CIHR-funded ARBs CORONA program and present results of plasma renin angiotensin (RAS) components and proteomics studies, preliminary results of our pan-Canadian COVID-19 cohort evaluation of angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs) in COVID-19, related meta-analyses (acute cardiac injury and acute kidney injury in COVID-19) , and an update of our recently launched international pivotal randomized controlled trial of an ARB (losartan) vs. usual care in adults hospitalized with COVID-19. Generic losartan is $0.25-0.50 per day, so if it proven effective, it could be used globally. I close with a future vision of COVID-19 prevention, care, and follow-up. Presenter: Dr. Russell is Professor of Medicine at University of British Columbia (UBC) and a Principal Investigator in the Centre for Heart Lung Innovation (HLI) at the University of British Columbia and St. Paul’s Hospital where he focuses on septic shock and COVID-19 research. He is on the editorial board of 5 journals, has 290 peer-reviewed publications, 277 international presentations, 45 chapters (including the chapter on septic shock in Cecil Medicine), 200 abstracts and 12 patents. Dr. Russell has four major current themes of research (1) randomized controlled trials in patients with septic shock and (2) the genomics and pharmacogenomics of septic shock. He is now developing two new themes (3) the renin angiotensin system (RAS) in COVID-19 and (4) operating characteristics and predictive value of short-term versus long-term outcome measures in sepsis. Dr. Russell’s research highlights (1) direct high impact on care of critically ill septic patients around the world, (2) publication in high impact journals, and (3) most important, illustrate the fundamental strategy of his research career, the successful coupling of expertise in clinical trials with biobanking and discovery of novel biomarkers that explain mechanisms of therapies in sepsis.
BC CDC Presenters
12/1/2020 8:00:00 PM
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Immunology of SARS-CoV-2 vaccine responses and extended dosing intervals
Summary: The goal is to discuss mechanistic immunological evidence supporting the effect of vaccine dosing interval and pre-existing endemic coronavirus cross-reactivity on SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccine antibody responses. Presenter: Dr. Pascal Lavoie is clinician-scientist and immunology researcher at BC Children's Hospital and UBC, who leads the Tracking COVID-19 for Safer Schools study, and a COVID-19 Immunity Task Force-funded study looking at SARS-CoV-2 vaccine responses in healthcare workers and children at BC Children's and Women's and Surrey Memorial Hospitals.
BC CDC Presenters
1/18/2022 8:00:00 PM
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Life After TB
Summary: People treated for TB often live with significant physical, mental, and socioeconomic challenges that persist long after they are considered “cured” from TB disease. In this talk we will discuss the challenges that people face after completing TB therapy and potential interventions that may improve the health and wellbeing of people treated for TB. Speakers: Kamila Romanowski is a PhD candidate at the University of British Columbia and a researcher within TB Services at the BC Centre for Disease Control. She is interested in epidemiology, implementation science, and the long term health outcomes of people who experience TB. Dr. Jay Johnston is the Evaluation Lead at Provincial TB Services, Head of the Division of Respiratory Medicine at Vancouver General Hospital, and Associate Clinical Professor in the UBC Department of Medicine.
BC CDC Presenters
3/22/2022 7:00:00 PM
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Mitigating the impact of COVID-19 on marginalized people: The ‘Accelerating SARS-CoV-2 SEroprevalence SurveyS Through Dried Blood Spots’ (ASSESS-DBS) Study
Sero-prevalence studies of people who are street entrenched, in prison, or live in remote or rural communities are challenging. We have experienced in the last couple of months that Point-of-care tests (PoCT) that use blood collected through finger prick (like a glucose test) seem to offer a solution to these challenges, but these tests lack specificity and therefore can’t provide the most accurate picture. On the other hand, Chemiluminescence Enzyme Immuno Assays that use blood drawn from veins have better performance, but with people who are not able to access care, or who have difficulties with venous access, these are not a viable option other. Dried Blood Spot testing may provide an effective solution to mitigate these problems. Dr. Sofia Bartlett is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the BCCDC & UBC with a background in infectious disease epidemiology, viral evolution, and molecular diagnostics. Her program of research seeks to address gaps in knowledge around infectious diseases, such as viral hepatitis, HIV, and COVID-19, that have the potential to inform public health policy and health programming, while also advancing the rights and the health of marginalized people. Dr. Muhammad Morshed is a Clinical Microbiologist and the Program Head for the Zoonotic Diseases and Emerging Pathogens and Parasitology Sections at BCCDC Public Health Laboratory. He is leading the COVID-19 serology validation project. His lab specializes in handling specialized serology of unusual pathogens.
BC CDC Presenters
7/21/2020 6:00:00 PM
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Monitoring SARS-CoV-2 Serological Responses During Pregnancy – Implications for Pregnant and General Populations
Bios: Dr. Deborah Money is a Professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and is an associate member of both the Department of Medicine and the School of Population and Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, and an affiliate member of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Science, at the University of British Columbia (UBC). Previously, Dr. Money was the Executive Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at UBC from 2006 to 2020, the inaugural Executive Director of the Women’s Health Research Institute (WHRI), and Vice-President, Research, BC Women’s Hospital (2016-2006). Dr. Money was appointed to the federal COVID Immunity Task Force, the National Advisory Committee on Immunizations Working Groups on COVID vaccine in pregnancy and Influenza vaccines in pregnancy, the WHO working group on COVID in pregnancy, the Global Prospective Metaanalysis on COVID in pregnancy. She is past chair and current member of the Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists of Canada Infection in pregnancy committee and recently appointed to the International Federation of Obstetrics and Gynecology Infections in Pregnancy committee. Dr. Inna Sekirov is a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and a Medical Microbiologist and Mycobacteriology Laboratory Program Head at the BCCDC Public Health Laboratory. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Sekirov has co-led the introduction of SARS-CoV-2 serological testing at the BCCDC PHL and is actively involved in a variety of research projects investigating the serological responses to SARS-CoV-2; among them utilizing the residual antenatal serum samples for population level SARS-CoV-2 serosurveillance. Summary: Learning objectives: To review the overall COVID-19 Canadian antenatal seroprevalence project To share the approach and data on the BC serosurveillance approach To share data on immune responses in pregnancy and transplacental and breast milk antibody transfer
BC CDC Presenters
11/8/2022 8:00:00 PM
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Monkeypox Response in BC
Summary: In 2022, a global outbreak of monkeypox occurred outside of endemic regions, including BC. The monkeypox outbreak will be discussed, with emphasis on the BC public health and laboratory response, unique clinical findings, and patient management strategies. Presenters: Dr. Mayank Singal is the physician lead for enteric, vector-borne, and zoonotic diseases at the BCCDC. He is the medical epidemiologist lead for investigation of Monkeypox outbreak. In the past, he has led numerous local and provincial outbreak investigations as well as the development of guidelines for control and prevention of communicable diseases, including rabies and COVID-19. Dr. Mark Hull is a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of British Columbia and Infectious Diseases consultant at St Paul’s Hospital. He provides HIV and HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis services in a number of community clinics in Vancouver, with a focus on gbMSM populations. His research focuses on evaluating HIV outcomes, uptake of PrEP and prevention of other sexually transmitted infections amongst gbMSM. Dr. Agatha Jassem is a Clinical Microbiologist and the Program Head of the Virology Lab at the BC Centre for Disease Control Public Health Laboratory. She is also a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Jassem oversees diagnostic testing and her research focuses on evaluating new strategies for detecting and charactering viruses and viral exposures.
BC CDC Presenters
10/11/2022 7:00:00 PM
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Overdose, health equity and prescribed safer supply in the time of pandemic
Summary: Overdose continues to be an ongoing public health emergency, accounting for over 70,000 years of life lost in 2020. In this presentation we will review recent trends in overdose with an emphasis on the impact of the pandemic on persons who use substances, including widening health inequities experienced by First Nations peoples in BC. The presentation will also review recent findings from an ongoing CIHR and MSFHR-funded evaluation on prescribed safer supply initiatives that were launched in March 2020. Presenters: Dr. Amanda Slaunwhite is a Senior Scientist and the lead of the Provincial Overdose Cohort at the BCCDC. She is an adjunct professor in the School of Population and Public Health at UBC. Louise Meilleur is the Director of Health Surveillance for the First Nations Health Authority. Dr. Heather Palis is a Postdoctoral Fellow with the BCCDC’s Provincial Overdose Cohort team and in the Department of Psychiatry at UBC.
BC CDC Presenters
11/16/2021 8:00:00 PM
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Preclinical studies of a protein subunit vaccine for COVID-19
Presenter: Dr. Robert Brunham is the head of the UBC-CDC Vaccine Research Laboratory at BCCDC and a professor emeritus of medicine at UBC. Until 2014, he was also the executive and scientific director of BCCDC. Summary: A COVID vaccine initiative was launched in July at UBC and BCCDC to search for a protein subunit vaccine. An interim report of the strategy taken and progress made will be given.
BC CDC Presenters
12/8/2020 8:00:00 PM
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Pre-existing immunity against SARS-CoV-2: What to make of the data?
SARS-CoV-2 caused an exceptionally high number of deaths and disability in a very short period of time worldwide. In contrast, infections in most results in mild disease. While age, sex, auto-antibodies (in a small proportion of people) and co-morbidities clearly modulate disease risk, we still don’t know much about the reasons for the broad range of COVID-19 clinical presentations, aside from a main role of age. Multiple research groups around the world have reported pre-existing antibody or T cell reactivity against SARS-CoV-2 in absence of prior infection, likely to previous exposures to endemic coronaviruses. In this lecture, I will discuss some of this evidence, what to make of it (or not), and present an ongoing study to determine the impact of pre-existing immune reactivity on responses to a single SARS-CoV-2 vaccine dose in virus-naïve individuals. Dr. Pascal Lavoie is a Clinician-Scientist, Associate professor at the University of British Columbia and staff Neonatologist at BC Women’s Hospital. He completed medical school, and a PhD in human immunology at McGill University, a pediatric residency at Sainte-Justine Hospital in Montreal, and a fellowship in Neonatal/Perinatal Medicine at UBC, where he joined as full-time Faculty in 2008. His core research focuses on the developing immune system in early life. However, with the pandemic, a major focus of his research was re-oriented towards understanding immunity to SARS-CoV-2 at the population level, as well as two COVID-19 Immunity Task Force-funded studies on the 1) impact of pre-existing immunity on SARS-CoV-2 vaccine responses, and 2) SARS-CoV-2 infections within schools.
BC CDC Presenters
6/15/2021 7:00:00 PM
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Provincial CKD-TB Screening Program: epidemiological impact, safety, and provincial uptake - December 3, 2019 Grand Rounds
Talk summary: In 2012, BC began rolling out a province-wide latent TB screening program aimed at systematically screening all people initiating chronic dialysis with a combination of a risk assessment questionnaire, a chest X-ray, and an interferon-gamma release assay (IGRA), and treating when appropriate. Dr. Jay Johnston and Kamila Romanowski will be presenting on the epidemiological impact, safety, and provincial uptake of this program. Dr. Jay Johnston is a tuberculosis physician and researcher at BCCDC. He is Associate Clinical Professor in the UBC Department of Medicine and Head of the VGH Division of Respiratory Medicine. Kamila Romanowski is a PhD student at the University of British Columbia and a researcher within Provincial TB Services at the BCCDC.
BC CDC Presenters
12/3/2019 8:00:00 PM
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Public Health Community Engagement with Asian Populations in British Columbia during COVID-19: Towards A Culture-Centered Approach
Summary: COVID-19 has posed significant challenges to those who endeavor to provide equitable public health information and services. This presentation shares results from a study on how community leaders, advocates, and public health communication specialists approached community engagement among Asian immigrant and diaspora communities in BC throughout the pandemic. Presenter: Wendy Pringle, PhD, MA, is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Vaccine Evaluation Center, BC Children's Hospital Research Institute. Dr. Pringle brings her critical and interpretive communication training to the study of vaccine communication in community and healthcare settings. She works with Dr. Julie Bettinger and the Canadian Immunization Research Network to better understand how perinatal healthcare providers discuss vaccines with patients. Other current projects focus on COVID vaccine decision making and paths for improving pandemic policy effectiveness.
BC CDC Presenters
5/31/2022 7:00:00 PM
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Reduce, Rebalance, and Replenish: Investigating the infant microbiota to minimize antibiotics-associated asthma risk
Presenters: Darlene Dai, MSc: I have an MSc in Statistics from UBC and 7-years of work experience as a biostatistician in discovering genomic biomarkers of cancer, heart, and lung disease in academia and industry. I am currently pursuing my PhD degree in Experimental Medicine at UBC under the co-supervision of Drs. Stuart Turvey and Raymond Ng. My research focuses on exploring and understanding the associations across infant gut microbiome, environmental factors and pediatric asthma. By using the CHILD Cohort Study, my PhD project aims to develop a precision health approach empowered by “omics” to predict, and ultimately prevent early-onset asthma. Please reach out if you would like to learn more about me and my research! Charisse Petersen, PhD: I earned a PhD in Microbiology and Immunology from The University of Utah in 2017 interrogating immune-microbiota interactions within the mammalian gut. I continued this work as a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Brett Finlay’s lab at UBC with a specific focus on early-life microbiota maturation and immune development. I joined Dr. Stuart Turvey’s lab in 2020, and I have to say that the best part of my job is working with studies like the CHILD study to shine a light on all the wonderful things that our microbiota does to support infant development. The more that we know, the better we can be at protecting these important bacteria in order to keep infants and children healthy. Summary: Early antibiotic exposure is linked to persistent disruption of the infant gut microbiome and subsequent elevated pediatric asthma risk. Breastfeeding acts as a primary modulator of the gut microbiome during early life, however, its impact on asthma development has remained unclear. We harnessed the CHILD cohort to interrogate the influence of breastfeeding on antibiotic-associated asthma risk (n=2,521) and coupled this with metagenomic profiling of the infant gut microbiome in a subset of participants (n=1,338). Children who took antibiotics without breastfeeding had 3-fold higher asthma odds, while there was no such association in children who received antibiotics while breastfeeding. This benefit was associated with widespread ‘re-balancing’ of taxonomic and functional components of the infant microbiome. Functional changes associated with asthma protection were linked to enriched Bifidobacterium longum subspecies infantis colonization. Subsequent interrogation of human milk oligosaccharide (HMO) composition from paired maternal human milk samples for 561 of these infants revealed a selection of HMOs that were positively associated with both B. infantis and these broader functional changes. Our data suggest that breastfeeding and antibiotics exert opposing effects on the infant microbiome and that breastfeeding enrichment of B. infantis may mitigate antibiotic-associated asthma risk.
Mediasite Presenter
5/16/2023 7:00:00 PM
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Respiratory and patient reported outcomes after hospitalisation with COVID-19 and implications for follow-up
Summary: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has led to over 86 million confirmed cases and nearly 2 million deaths globally. There is growing evidence that patients can have persistent symptoms and physiologic sequelae well after COVID-19 recovery, supporting the need for short and long term patient follow-up. In this presentation, we will discuss the development of the Post-COVID-19 Respiratory Clinic (PCRC) at St. Paul's Hospital and Vancouver General Hospital and review the research it has generated including studies looking at respiratory and patient reported outcomes after COVID-19. We will then discuss the implications these findings have on the long-term management of patients recovering from COVID-19. Presenters: Dr. Alyson Wong completed her core medical training at the University of British Columbia (UBC), followed by a Respirology fellowship at Dalhousie University. She subsequently returned to UBC where she completed a 2-year Interstitial Lung Disease (ILD) clinical and research fellowship and Master of Health Science. Dr. Wong is currently a Clinical Instructor in the Department of Medicine at UBC and postdoctoral research fellow with the Centre for Heart Lung Innovation. She works as a respirologist in the Interstitial Lung Disease program at St. Paul's Hospital. Dr. Aditi Shah is part of Faculty of Medicine, Division of Respirology at University of British Columbia. She completed her training in Respiratory medicine at University of Saskatchewan and has received clinical and research training in Sleep Medicine and Neuromuscular respiratory disease at University of British Columbia. She is currently working as a Respirologist at Vancouver General Hospital and in Sleep Medicine department at University of British Columbia Hospital.
BC CDC Presenters
1/19/2021 8:00:00 PM
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SARS-CoV-2 variants: detection, characterization, and impacts on outcomes
Summary: The BCCDC Public Health Laboratory is equipped with a wide range of tools to deploy in pandemic responses. Molecular, genomic, culture and serological analyses linked to exposure, vaccination and patient outcome data can inform strategies to prevent disease and control spread and transmission. Here we share data and novel methods from research projects that employed laboratory data to help respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Presenters: Dr. Agatha Jassem, PhD, D(ABMM), FCCM, is a Clinical Microbiologist and the Program Head of the Virology Lab at the BC Centre for Disease Control Public Health Laboratory. She is also a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Jassem oversees diagnostic testing and her research focuses on evaluating new strategies for detecting and charactering viruses and viral exposures. Dr. Natalie Prystajecky works as a microbiologist at the BCCDC Public Health Laboratory (PHL), where she oversees two laboratories: Environmental Microbiology and the Molecular and Microbial Genomics. Dr. Prystajecky is also a Clinical Associate at the University of British Columbia. In her clinical roles and research endeavours, she uses emerging technologies such as genomics to improve routine surveillance and outbreak investigations, including for SARS-CoV-2. Dr. Hind Sbihi, PhD, B.eng, is a Senior Scientist in the Data & Analytics Services, supporting the Public Health Laboratory, at the BC Centre for Disease Control and Adjunct Professor at the University of British Columbia’s School of Population and Public Health. She is leading the integration and reporting of laboratory diagnostic and genomic data with Ministry of Health and Health Authorities data for real-time reporting on COVID-19.
BC CDC Presenters
2/8/2022 8:00:00 PM
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Shadows and Light: A Physician's Lens on COVID
This recording will only be available online for one month, starting Sept 21, 2022. All images in the presentation are copyrighted. Presenter: Dr. Heather Patterson is an adult and pediatric emergency physician and photographer from Calgary, Alberta. When the pandemic struck, Patterson decided to put her twenty years of photography experience to use and began photographing the intimate moments at Calgary hospitals that went on to become Shadows and Light, her recent book publication. Photographs from the project have been featured in Macleans, where they were a finalist for a National Magazine Award, and the Calgary Herald and on CBC, CityNews, Global News, and CTV. Patterson has received the Award for Medical Journalism from the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians and her work has been featured in medical journals and presented at conference and grand rounds across Canada. Summary: Through a chronological visual story of the people who have experienced the pandemic first-hand, Heather shares how she found hope and a renewed sense of purpose in the resilience of the human spirit and the inspiring fortitude of Canada’s pandemic heroes. Intimate images of healthcare workers, support staff, patients and families, shed light on the compassion, teamwork, and even joy that can be found amidst tragedy. The images and stories highlight love and loss, kindness and grace, and the importance of authenticity during an epidemic of burnout, delivering a message that is relevant and critically important during our current health-care crisis.
BC CDC Presenters
9/13/2022 7:00:00 PM
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Support for School Vaccine Mandates in British Columbia
Summary: School vaccine mandates are population health interventions that require monitoring and communicating about the vaccination status of school-aged children, with the aim of controlling infectious disease in the population. While such policies are usually associated with higher vaccine coverage in the pediatric population, in cases where mandates are highly controversial they may be ineffective or risk unintended consequences such as backlash; therefore, monitoring of population attitudes toward new mandates is important. With the implementation of the Vaccine Status Reporting Regulation (VSRR) in 2019, BC became the 3rd Canadian province with a school vaccine mandate. This presentation will share results of monitoring to date of population attitudes toward the components of the VSRR and describe next steps in policy implementation and surveillance to minimize risks of unintended consequences. Presenter: Devon Greyson (PhD, MLIS) is Assistant Professor at the UBC School of Population and Public Health, where they study the influence of information and information-based interventions on population health outcomes.
BC CDC Presenters
6/14/2022 7:00:00 PM
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The 2019-nCoV Novel Coronavirus – what we know and what we’re finding out
Dr. Inna Sekirov joined the team of BCCDC PHL Medical Microbiologists in 2017. She is the program head for TB/Mycobacteriology laboratory and has a particular interest in molecular/genomics-based diagnostics and epidemiology. Dr. Natalie Prystajecky is the program head for the Environmental Microbiology program and co-leads the Molecular and Microbial Genomics program at the BCCDC Public Health Laboratory. She is also a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine at UBC. Dr. Prystajecky’s research expertise includes genomics and molecular diagnostics. She uses emerging technologies to improve routine surveillance and outbreak investigations for pathogens. Dr. Mel Krajden is the medical director of the BCCDC Public Health Laboratory. He is also the medical head of hepatitis at BCCDC and is involved in the BC Hepatitis Testers Cohort. His laboratory research involves the application of molecular techniques to diagnose viruses, assess correlates between infection and clinical disease, use molecular techniques to monitor antiviral efficacy and track microbial infections for epidemiological purposes.
BC CDC Presenters
2/4/2020 8:00:00 PM
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The BC Good Samaritan Drug Overdose Act evaluation: Lack of awareness, limited protection, "but better than nothing"?
The Good Samaritan Drug Overdose Act, enacted in 2017, provides protection at the scene of an overdose, for possession of drugs for personal use, in order to reduce concerns of police attendance and encourage people to call 9-1-1. Our study, funded by the BC Ministry of Health, is a multidisciplinary collaboration to assess the knowledge, attitudes and implementation of the Act from the perspectives of enforcement and people at risk of witnessing or experiencing an overdose, including youth and people on release from prison. We will share findings from the study to date, highlight resultant initiatives and discuss potential policy implications as BC and Canada explore decriminalization to address the unacceptable and preventable drug toxicity overdoses and deaths. Dr. Jane Buxton is a public health physician and professor in the UBC School of Population and Public Health. She is medical lead for harm reduction at BC Centre for Disease Control. She developed the Drug Overdose and Alert Partnership to identify and respond to issues related to illegal drugs. In 2012 she led the implementation of the BC Take Home Naloxone program - which has shipped one million kits to distribution sites across the province. Jane's research uses qualitative and quantitative approaches, and she is committed to including the authentic voices of the experts - people with lived and living experience - in developing policy, program planning and evaluation, and research. Jessica Xavier is the research coordinator for the Good Samaritan Drug Overdose Act evaluation at the BC Centre for Disease Control. Prior to her work at the BC Centre for Disease Control, Jessica’s research was focused on increasing accessibility to supervised consumption sites in Ontario for groups who experience barriers to access. Jessica holds a master’s in public health in Health Promotion. Her research interests include community-based research with people who use drugs and effective drug policy.
BC CDC Presenters
6/8/2021 7:00:00 PM
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The Changing Landscape of SARS-CoV-2 Variants in BC
Presenters: Dr. John R Tyson PhD has a background in molecular cell biology and genomics, with a particular focus on next generation sequencing technologies and molecular diagnostics. He has recently joined the BCCDC as a Senior Scientist focusing on microbial genomics. Over the last year in collaboration with local and international colleges he has helped developed cost effective, and widely adopted, SARS-CoV-2 sequencing methods (ARTIC network amplicon sequencing). His work has continued within the BCCDC on tracking and characterizing the genetic drift observed in the SARS-CoV-2 genome lineages here in BC and the emergence of variants of concern (VoC). Dr. Catherine Hogan MD MSc recently joined the BCCDC as a medical microbiologist. Her research interests include novel diagnostic methods, metabolomics for infectious diseases diagnostics and tropical medicine. She has been very active in investigating diagnostic aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic, ranging from large-scale healthcare worker screening to novel molecular testing, and contributing directly-applicable knowledge with the goal of improving public health and clinical outcomes. Summary: The arrival of the SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern has triggered a need to go beyond a simple positive diagnosis. In BC, an integrated approach incorporating both rapid variant-specific qPCR detection and whole genome sequencing (WGS) has been used to provide timely genetic characterization. These approaches enable the identification and tracking of specific mutations upon arrival and upon onward transmission. This is particularly important in the early days of novel variant emergence and provides an opportunity for implementation of enhanced mitigation strategies. How this approach will evolve as VoCs become established in BC will be discussed and the changes required as the landscape of variants shifts with new variants anticipated to emerge secondary to vaccination roll-out. Knowledge of the shifting SARS-CoV-2 genetic landscape integrated into the rich epidemiological data available here in BC will assist efforts going forward tracking the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants and any specific impact they may have.
BC CDC Presenters
3/30/2021 7:00:00 PM
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The Changing Landscape of SARS-CoV-2 Variants in BC - Mar 30, 2021
Presenters: Dr. John R Tyson PhD has a background in molecular cell biology and genomics, with a particular focus on next generation sequencing technologies and molecular diagnostics. He has recently joined the BCCDC as a Senior Scientist focusing on microbial genomics. Over the last year in collaboration with local and international colleges he has helped developed cost effective, and widely adopted, SARS-CoV-2 sequencing methods (ARTIC network amplicon sequencing). His work has continued within the BCCDC on tracking and characterizing the genetic drift observed in the SARS-CoV-2 genome lineages here in BC and the emergence of variants of concern (VoC). Dr. Catherine Hogan MD MSc recently joined the BCCDC as a medical microbiologist. Her research interests include novel diagnostic methods, metabolomics for infectious diseases diagnostics and tropical medicine. She has been very active in investigating diagnostic aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic, ranging from large-scale healthcare worker screening to novel molecular testing, and contributing directly-applicable knowledge with the goal of improving public health and clinical outcomes. Summary: The arrival of the SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern has triggered a need to go beyond a simple positive diagnosis. In BC, an integrated approach incorporating both rapid variant-specific qPCR detection and whole genome sequencing (WGS) has been used to provide timely genetic characterization. These approaches enable the identification and tracking of specific mutations upon arrival and upon onward transmission. This is particularly important in the early days of novel variant emergence and provides an opportunity for implementation of enhanced mitigation strategies. How this approach will evolve as VoCs become established in BC will be discussed and the changes required as the landscape of variants shifts with new variants anticipated to emerge secondary to vaccination roll-out. Knowledge of the shifting SARS-CoV-2 genetic landscape integrated into the rich epidemiological data available here in BC will assist efforts going forward tracking the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants and any specific impact they may have.
BC CDC Presenters
3/30/2021 7:00:00 PM
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The effect of vaccination against pertussis during pregnancy on infants’ antibody responses to primary and booster vaccinations.
Vaccination with tetanus-diphtheria-acellular pertussis (Tdap) vaccine in pregnancy aims to protect young infants from "whooping cough" disease in young infancy. This strategy is highly effective in reducing pertussis disease in young infants and is recommended in Canada and increasingly number of countries. This individual-participant data meta-analysis funded by British Columbia Immunization Committee aimed to determine the effect of Tdap vaccination in pregnancy on infants’ vaccine responses and factors affecting these immune responses. Infants of women vaccinated against pertussis in pregnancy had lower antibody levels against pertussis, diphtheria and some streptococcus pneumoniae serotypes after their vaccination compared with infants of unvaccinated women. Maternally-derived antibodies induced by Tdap vaccination in pregnancy reduced infants’ immune responses to primary and booster vaccination. Enhanced surveillance of pertussis, diphtheria and invasive pneumococcal disease in infants of women vaccinated with Tdap in pregnancy is needed to determine the clinical significance of these findings. Infant vaccination programs may need to be modified in settings where Tdap vaccination in pregnancy is implemented, if these lower antibody levels are clinically significant. Presenter: Dr. Bahaa Abu-Raya is a Pediatric Infectious Disease Physician-scientist at the Vaccine Evaluation Center, University of British Columbia. Dr. Abu-Raya's research has been predominantly in the field of pertussis immunization in pregnancy and his research has contributed to immunization policy in several countries. Specifically, the recommendation that pregnant women need to be immunized with pertussis vaccine in every pregnancy and also the ideal timing of pertussis immunization in pregnancy. Dr Abu-Raya is the recipient of the prestigious 2019 European Society for Pediatric Infectious Diseases Young Investigator Award and Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship.
BC CDC Presenters
2/23/2021 8:00:00 PM
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The harm reduction client survey: From small beginnings to influencing harm reduction policy and programs
This presentation will explore how the harm reduction client survey was introduced in 2012 for quality assurance purposes and to provide a snapshot of substance use across BC. Since that time the survey has expanded into an invaluable tool in the ever changing context of highly toxic drugs and the devastating overdose crisis. We will share some findings and how these have informed policy, program development and evaluation, research and knowledge translation priorities. We will also highlight how people with lived and living experience are engaged in all steps of the survey development, administration and interpretation of the findings. Presenters: Dr. Jane Buxton is a public health physician and professor in the UBC School of Population and Public Health. She is medical lead for harm reduction at BC Centre for Disease Control. She developed the Drug Overdose and Alert Partnership to identify and respond to issues related to illegal drugs. In 2012 she led the implementation of the BC Take Home Naloxone program - which has shipped one million kits to distribution sites across the province. Jane's research uses qualitative and quantitative approaches, and she is committed to including the authentic voices of the experts - people with lived and living experience - in developing policy, program planning and evaluation, and research. Charlene Burmeister has over 12 years of experience in peer engagement and leadership, and holds several roles including the People with Lived and Living Experience Stakeholder Engagement Lead for the BC Centre for Disease Control, and is the Founder and Executive Director of the Coalition of Substance Users of the North. She is also a board member of the Canadian Association of People Who Use Drugs. Charlene was one of the first members of the provincial advisory committee, PEEP in 2015 and continues to inform provincial harm reduction policy using her expertise and leadership. Max Ferguson is a research epidemiologist on the BCCDC's Harm Reduction team. They hold a dual Master of Public Health and Master of Science in Nursing from the University of British Columbia. They are currently leading the development of a Canadian Take-Home Naloxone Best Practice Guideline.
BC CDC Presenters
9/21/2021 7:00:00 PM
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The Interior Health Drinking Water for Everyone Initiative
Presenter: Ivor Norlin is the Manager of the Drinking Water Systems Program with Interior Health. Having been with Interior Health since 2005, Ivor previously worked in the environment sector in BC and Alberta. Ivor is a professional biologist and Environmental Health Officer and holds two bachelor degrees and a master degree in environmental and health studies. Born and raised in Armstrong, Ivor lives in Salmon Arm with his wife and two children. Summary: An overview of the Interior Health Drinking Water for Everyone initiative including the development of a dedicated website and real-time advisory map for all permitted water systems in the southern interior region. We will talk about the why, what, how, and what’s next.
BC CDC Presenters
9/27/2022 7:00:00 PM
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The Medicine Bundle Pilot: Communities Driving Change
Summary: The Medicine Bundle Pilot is an Indigenous approach to the HIV-ST and DBS kits. In response to the barriers and needs that were identified through community consultations the sexual health Medicine Bundle was developed. Under the concept of Two-Eyed Seeing – weaving western and Indigenous knowledge for the benefit of all – the Medicine Bundle is an Indigenous approach to addressing the needs and barriers to sexual health testing and resources faced by Two-Spirit folks in rural and remote communities throughout BC. Presenter: Martin Morberg is a Two-Spirit Northern Tutchone and Tlingit man from the remote community of Mayo, Yukon Territory. He is a member of the Na Cho Nyak Dun First Nation. “It’s my goal to empower the lives and voices of Two-Spirit and Indigenous people affected by HIV and addictions while contributing to the visibility of these communities.” Much of Martin's work and activism is rooted in community and grassroots initiatives and he acknowledges that many Indigenous leaders and community members have guided and supported him in growing into the activist he is today. He hopes to pay this knowledge and support forward to Indigenous communities and Two-Spirit people and contribute to the meaningful work and reclamation of Two-Spirit culture and identity. Martin is the Two-Spirit Program Coordinator at the Community-Based Research Centre.
BC CDC Presenters
6/28/2022 7:00:00 PM
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The Pandemic Acid Test: What We've Learned About How to Improve BC's Health Research System
Pandemics will occur again and will require a coordinated, rapid response research capacity. Successes aside, BC researchers encountered major obstacles to rapid response research during the pandemic. We will examine these lessons and discuss the opportunity of functioning as a more integrated learning health research system in BC and Canada. There are clear implications for integrated public health service and research organizations like BCCDC. Presenter: Dr. David Patrick is an infectious diseases specialist and epidemiologist with a career interest in responding to emerging infectious diseases. Dr. Patrick is Director of Research and Medical Epidemiology Lead for Antimicrobial Resistance at the BC Centre for Disease Control, and Professor in the UBC School of Population and Public Health.
BC CDC Presenters
12/14/2021 8:00:00 PM
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The seven-year emergency: Unregulated drug poisoning events as a continuing public health threat in British Columbia
Summary: Drs. Slaunwhite and Palis will present data on drivers of the ongoing unregulated drug poisoning emergency. Conceptualizations of substance use, substance use disorder and risk of unregulated drug poisoning will be discussed. Analysis from the Provincial Overdose Cohort will be presented, to demonstrate populations for whom unregulated drug poisoning is elevated, including people with recent criminal legal system involvement. Interventions that can be introduced to reduce risk, including (prescribed) safer supply and peer-led interventions will be discussed. Presenter bios: Dr. Amanda Slaunwhite is an Assistant Professor (Partner) in the School of Population and Public Health at UBC and a Senior Scientist at the BC Centre for Disease Control. Dr. Slaunwhite holds a MSFHR Scholar Award, and is the co-Director of the Canadian Collaborative for Prison Health and Education (CCPHE). She has over a decade of experience working with administrative health data in BC, New Brunswick and the US on topics related to overdose, substance use and mental health. Dr. Slaunwhite actively partners with people with lived/living experience of substance use, overdose or incarceration as part of her research program, including the co-development and co-leadership of research projects. These projects include PREVAIL, in a partnership with Unlocking the Gates Non-Profit Society and Chee Mamuk, which provides peer support, cellular phones, and care and medicine bundles to people leaving correctional centres in BC who are at-risk of overdose mortality. Dr. Heather Palis is a Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of British Columbia, and BC Centre for Disease Control. Her postdoctoral research seeks to investigate recent interventions introduced in response to the overdose crisis in British Columbia (e.g. expanded opioid agonist treatment, pharmaceutical alternatives to the toxic drug supply), with a focus on the impact of these interventions on people who have been recently incarcerated. Her research uses administrative health and corrections records available in the Provincial Overdose Cohort held at the BC Centre for Disease Control, which offers the most comprehensive collection of records on fatal and non-fatal overdose events available in Canada. Heather’s postdoctoral research is supported by an MSFHR Research Trainee award, CIHR Fellowship, and UBC Institute of Mental Health Marshall Fellowship. Summary: Cumulative impacts refer to overlapping and persistent legacies of environmental change on ecosystems, communities and population health over time. While once primarily within the sole purview of impact assessment practitioners assessing major projects (e.g. dams, smelters, transmission lines), there is now growing recognition that cumulative environmental impacts of multiple land uses and climate change drive broader societal changes with implications for the health of individuals and communities. In light of this expanding discourse, new methodologies are required to quantify the totality of impact across social-ecological systems to support local and regional sustainability goals. Drawing from three regional case studies (Alberta Foothills, Northern Ontario, and British Columbia), this presentation presents an overview of a novel cumulative effects screening tool capable of merging environmental, socioeconomic and health data into a singular assessment architecture to quantify cumulative impacts across time and space. Opportunities and limitations associated with the tool’s utilization will be discussed, as well as future research opportunities to help better understand the relationship between cumulative environmental change and corresponding implications for communities and human health.
Mediasite Presenter
4/11/2023 7:00:00 PM
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The way ahead for travel measures during public health emergencies: Lessons for BC from the COVID-19 pandemic
Summary: Travel measures (ranging from advisories to border closures) were applied to an unprecedented degree by virtually all countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. A broad range of evidence shows that managing the public health risks from travel was necessary during the pandemic to reduce virus introduction and onward transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and its variants of concern. However, without scientific principles or strong evidence base to draw upon, and faced with a fast-moving novel pathogen, real time decision-making was largely uncoordinated across jurisdictions and frequently changing. The results regarding public health goals were suboptimal. The impacts on the functioning of broader society were costly, inequitable and undermining of public trust. The search is on for evidence-informed, equitable, and effective ways of using travel measures during a public health emergency. This talk will review why travel and thus travel measures matter during a pandemic, emerging risk-based approaches to inform their use, and the implications for BC and other jurisdictions without authority over international borders. Presenters: Dr. Kelley Lee is Professor, Canada Research Chair in Global Health Governance, and Scientific Director of the Pacific Institute on Pathogens, Pandemics and Society (PIPPS). She is currently leading the Pandemics and Borders Project, co-chairing (with Professor Tim Evans) the Royal Society of Canada/Canadian Academy of Health Sciences Expert Panel on Canada’s Role in Global Health, and serving as a Commissioner on the National University of Singapore-Lancet Pandemic Readiness, Implementation, Monitoring, and Evaluation Commission. She is also a member of the Editorial Board of the WHO Global Report on the Commercial Determinants of Health. Jennifer Fang is a Research Fellow and Project Manager in the Pacific Institute on Pathogens, Pandemics and Society (PIPPS). Her research with the Pandemics and Borders Project focuses on supporting core capacities under the International Health Regulations at points of entry, and understanding equity impacts of travel measures applied at the Canada-US border. Jennifer also maintains research interests in commercial determinants of health including analysis of the Chinese tobacco industry. With lived experience spanning three different continents, she has a personal interest in issues around discrimination and racism. Jennifer holds a Bachelor in Nutritional Sciences from UBC and a Master of Public Health from the University of Liverpool.
Mediasite Presenter
5/30/2023 7:00:00 PM
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Towards a comprehensive understanding of the overdose crisis and its relationship to social and health inequities
Talk summary: Three years into BC’s first public health emergency, there is growing acceptance that the overdose crisis will be a persistent public health challenge that is linked to multi-generational social, health, and economic inequities. In this context, there is a critical need to not only measure the current effects of the toxic drug supply on rates of overdose morbidity and mortality, but the contribution of risk environments and population health inequities to overdose risk and survival. This lecture will outline current efforts at the BCCDC and the First Nations Health Authority to understand the role of sociodemographic factors, disconnection from traditional culture, criminal justice involvement, and geographic determinants of health in reducing or exacerbating overdose risk, and the need for a nuanced understanding of the overdose crisis that reflects the complexity associated with the social determinants of health. Dr. Amanda Slaunwhite Amanda Slaunwhite is a Senior Scientist for the Provincial Overdose Cohort at the BC Centre for Disease Control. She is also an Adjunct Professor at the University of British Columbia’s School of Population and Public Health. Ms. Louise Mellieur Louise Meilleur is the Director of Health Surveillance for the First Nations Health Authority and holds dual Masters in Quantitative Psychology and Public Health and is a PhD candidate.
BC CDC Presenters
1/7/2020 8:00:00 PM
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Tracking SARS-CoV-2 in Australia
Description: Here, I will present the experience of tracking SARS-CoV-2 in Victoria, Australia, from a public health perspective. Going over the first, and second waves, a parliamentary inquiry, and ongoing efforts to carry out national surveillance in a context of a federation of independent states. Presenter: Dr. Anders Gonçalves da Silva has PhD from Columbia University in population genetics, and is currently the senior bioinformatician and Bioinformatics Section Head at the Microbiological Diagnostic Unit Public Health Laboratory, in Melbourne, Australia. For the past five years, he has been working to deliver high quality bioinformatics solutions for public health microbiology. More recently, he has been involved in the conception and initial role out of AusTrakka, a data sharing platform to enable real-time pathogen surveillance across jurisdictional boundaries.
BC CDC Presenters
8/25/2020 7:00:00 PM
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When will we have a COVID-19 vaccine?
Summary: At least 160 candidate SARS-CoV-2 vaccines are in development and being assessed in preclinical studies and clinical trials. In general, for a vaccine to be approved or licensed by regulatory authorities, it must demonstrate both safety and high efficacy in the prevention of a specific disease in the relevant populations. However, the COVID-19 pandemic poses specific logistic and scientific challenges with respect to the assessment of SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidates. Challenges to the evaluation of candidate vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 before approval or licensure during the ongoing pandemic include rapidly changing levels of exposure to the virus and population immunity, social distancing practices and the possibility of antibody-dependent enhancement of disease. Careful attention must also be paid to postlicensure assessment of vaccines, including the risk of antibody-dependent enhancement of disease, which must be actively monitored closely over multiple years after vaccination. Mathematical modelling results underlining the importance of vaccine efficacy in older age groups will also be highlighted in this talk. Presenters: Dr. Manish Sadarangani is Director of the Vaccine Evaluation Center at the BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute and an Assistant Professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases, UBC Department of Pediatrics. His research links clinical trials with basic microbiology, immunology and epidemiology to address clinically relevant problems related to immunization and vaccine-preventable diseases. Dr. Daniel Coombs obtained his MSc and PhD in applied mathematics from the University of Arizona. He then did postdoctoral work at Los Alamos National Lab, before joining the Department of Mathematics at UBC as a faculty member, in 2003. Dr. Coombs contributes to our understanding of health-related sciences, especially immunology, within-host infection, and epidemiology, through development and application of mathematical, computational, and statistical methods. He works closely with experimental scientists at UBC and BC Children’s Hospital Research Centre, and public health experts at the BCCDC. He is a member of the Canadian Chief Science Advisor’s expert panel on COVID19.
BC CDC Presenters
7/28/2020 6:00:00 PM
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