Read online: http://londonschoolofhygienetropicalmedicine.cmail1.com/t/ViewEmail/j/E87BB027D4260786/D043D07C8310511E907C5D7C792C0FF8

Start date: 19 January 2015       Duration: 2 weeks, 6 hours pw

The London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine is launching its first free online course with the help of its partner FutureLearn. The course will run for two weeks and will look at how Ebola, a disease that few people had heard of before this year, has caused a humanitarian crisis and worldwide panic.

It will define the principles of infectious disease transmission underlying the virus and the social context of the epidemic. It will also help explain how infectious diseases behave, how to reduce transmission and control the outbreak, as well as the impact of interventions and  lessons for the future.

This is a multidisciplinary course and teaching will be from experts in infectious disease epidemiology, anthropology, medicine and public health. This course is designed mainly for health professionals and students, though we hope it will be of wider interest, and is open to anyone with internet access. If you are interested, please do register and feel free to share this information with your partners and professional networks.

Main contributors:

Professor Judith Glynn, Lead Educator and Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology.

Professor Peter Piot,  Director of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, co-discovered the Ebola virus in 1976, was founding director of UNAIDS and Under Secretary-General of the United Nations and is currently Chair of the World Health Organization’s scientific committee on Ebola.

Professor David Heymann, Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology at the School, Co-Chair of the WHO Director General’s advisory group on the Ebola response and Chair of Public Health England.

Professor John Edmunds, Dean of the Faculty of Epidemiology and Population Health at the  School, member of the World Health Organization’s scientific committee on Ebola, leading mathematical  modelling of the epidemic.

Dr Fred Martineau, paediatrician and researcher, coordinator for the Ebola Response Anthropology Platform.

Dr Shunmay Yeung, paediatrician and health policy researcher, recently returned from working with Save the Children in Sierra Leone.

Dr Olivier Le Polain, public health physician and epidemiologist, recently returned from working with Save the Children in Liberia

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Let’s build a future where people are no longer dying for lack of healthcare knowledge – Join HIFA: www.hifa2015.org  

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