McMaster University

Department of Biology

Seminar Series

Michael Li

McMaster University, Department of Biology

Graduate Student with Dr. Ben Bolker and Dr. Jonathan Dushoff

Are we ready for the next disease outbreak?

Mathematical and statistical models are often used to forecast infectious disease outbreaks. Slow access to disease-incidence data and limited information about disease natural history can make prediction extremely challenging. Over the past few years, I modeled disease spread in three dramatically different contexts:

• Disease X: a hypothetical emerging disease with limited data (motivated by the 2014 West African Ebola outbreak)
• Canine rabies: a disease that (unnecessarily) continues to claim tens of thousands of lives in Africa and Asia
• Influenza in Ontario: a disease system with a great deal of information, where we still have much to learn about patterns of illness, health-care demand and mortality.

Our findings have implications for predicting and preventing the spread of infectious diseases.

Thursday May 23, 2019

4:00 p.m.

Health Sciences Center room 1A4

Refreshments will be served at 3:30 in HS-1A4

Please bring your own mug!

For further information contact Department of Biology (905) 525-9140 ext. 24400