Innovative Epidemic Response Plan Earns Global Health Students Third Place in International Case Competition
A team of McMaster students took third place in the recent international Emory Global Health Case Competition, which tasked this year’s teams with coming up with a method to contain a deadly virus during the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.
MSc Global Health students Forouhideh Pervandi, Selina Manji, Erin Slade, and Fazila Kassam, along with Engineering student Jane Su and Nursing student Allison Campbell, created an epidemic response plan that was unique in its technological innovations.
Their plan included a FIFA app with a health screening questionnaire, a GIS map tracking the outbreak, and a wellness kit sponsored by major advertisers.
“The global health program has provided us with an excellent platform to think creatively about global disease – not just in terms of a health problem, but in a social, economic, business, environmental and cultural context as well,” explains Slade.
The case competition, hosted annually at Emory University in Atlanta, challenges graduate and undergraduate students from multiple schools and disciplines to develop solutions to real-world global health problems. 150 students from 25 teams around the world participated in this year’s event.
Students were given the full case study the Saturday before the competition to begin developing their response plan. They then flew to Atlanta the following Thursday and worked together all-day Friday to prepare a 15-minute presentation which they delivered to a panel of judges the next day.
Judges included the past president of the CDC, and other global health leaders and experts in research on infectious diseases, from HIV and AIDS to Ebola.
After the McMaster team was selected as one of four finalists from the first round of 25 universities, a twist was added to the case – bioterrorism threats – and the team had under an hour to rethink their strategy and prepare another presentation for the judges.
“I think the project development skills we’ve gained and ability to work effectively across multidisciplinary teams contributed to our success,” says Slade.
McMaster was the only Canadian university represented in-person at the competition this year. A University of Toronto team participated via video.
McMaster’s success at the Emory Competition follows the win at the Toronto Thinks 2018 Global Health Case Competition, where a group students from the Global Health program secured first place and the participant’s choice award.
Global Health News
Related News
News Listing
March 4, 2024