Staff Research Rounds - Prof Fraser & Dr Ferretti

Date:

Wed, 17 May 2023

Time:

10:30am-12pm [Singapore [GMT +8]

Location:

Seminar Room 1, Level 8
Tahir Foundation Building (MD1)
National University of Singapore
12 Science Drive 2, Singapore 117549

Details:

You are cordially invited to the ON-SITE SSHSPH Staff Research Round. We look forward to your attendance and we hope for an interesting discussion.

Refreshments will be provided at 10am, do drop by to hang out for a bit before the session starts.

We will also be having a Lucky Draw at the end of the session, register yourself and stand a chance to win a special prize!

*Only Attendees will be included in the Lucky draw*

Abstract:

Testing, tracing, isolating, and quarantine (TTIQ) are the mainstays of the initial response to a new pathogen. The extent to which they mitigate epidemic spread depends on the reproduction number R and on the extent of pre-symptomatic transmission, as well as on many logistical and behavioural factors. Early analysis of SARS-COV-2 indicated that the effect of TTIQ might be limited due to extensive pre-symptomatic and pauci-symptomatic transmission. We proposed that the use of digital contact tracing could enhance the speed and reach of TTIQ policies and supported the resulting NHS COVID-19 app through its design, deployment, and evaluation. I will describe each stage. For the design stage, I will describe how epidemiology fitted into a range of design considerations, resulting in many countries adopting the decentralised exposure notification system co-implemented by Google and Apple. In the deployment stage, I will describe insights from the analytic programme which gave real-time insights into the utility of the app, and broader insights into the unfolding epidemic, new variants, and the behavioural response of the population. In the evaluation stage, I will present estimates of the number of cases averted, which likely number over a million in the pre-vaccine phase of the epidemic and emphasise methodological aspects. Finally, in lessons learnt, I will explore how this intervention might be improved for response to future emerging infections, comparing the NHS app to that used in other countries.

Speakers:

Prof Christophe Fraser
Professor, Infectious Disease Epidemiology of the University of Oxford

Prof. Christophe Fraser is the Moh Family Foundation Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology of the University of Oxford. He is an infectious disease epidemiologist who heads an inter‐disciplinary research group committed to improving human health through population science. He is the lead for Data, Analytics and Epidemiology at the Pandemic Sciences Institute and is Senior Group Leader in Pathogen Dynamics at the Big Data Institute in the Nuffield Department of Medicine. His research aims at studying the population dynamics and epidemiology of pathogens through mathematical modelling, statistical analysis and pathogen genomics, and translating this knowledge to public health.

Prof. Fraser played key roles in the response to SARS, H1N1 pandemic influenza, Ebola and COVID-19. He has worked with HIV groups in Europe, Africa and the USA, and consulted for the World Health Organization, the CDC, the NIH and other leading organizations on influenza, HIV, and antimicrobial resistance. He is leading the modeling and phylogenetics components of the HPTN071 PopART cluster randomized trial of HIV-1 prevention, the BEEHIVE project on the European HIV epidemic from the European Research Council, and the PANGEA-HIV consortium funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to bring together six leading African cohorts and characterize the HIV epidemic in high-prevalence settings. During the COVID-19 pandemic he envisaged and promoted contact tracing apps and the integration of digital responses and rapid diagnostics into pandemic mitigation. He advised the UK government, Apple, Google and other governments, and collaborated with the UK Department of Health to develop and evaluate the NHS COVID-19 app.

Abstract:

Contact-tracing apps measure proximity and duration of close contacts, allowing individuals who had risky exposures to be rapidly notified when cases are confirmed. Beyond their impact as a public health intervention, these app can reveal individual and population determinants of transmissions. In this talk, we summarise the main epidemiological insights we have obtained from the NHS COVID-19 app used in England and Wales. Analysing digitally recorded exposure measurements from >7 million exposed individuals, we disentangled the contributions of proximity and duration of exposure to the risk of SARS-CoV-2 transmission. The app’s capabilities for precision epidemic surveillance at scale also offered unprecedented and near-real-time insights into epidemic dynamics, giving early indications of changes in the reproduction number Rt and showing whether these were driven by daily changes in population contact rates, infectiousness, duration and type of exposures.

Speakers:

Dr Luca Ferretti
Research Fellow, Pandemic Sciences Institute of the University of Oxford

Luca Ferretti is a Career Development Fellow of the Pandemic Sciences Institute of the University of Oxford and a researcher at the Big Data Institute of the Nuffield Department of Medicine. He is a translational scientist with extensive multidisciplinary experience in complex systems, genomics, evolution and epidemiology of infectious diseases. His research revolves around models and methods to analyse and understand the epidemiological and evolutionary dynamics of viral pathogens, with a focus on major threats to human and animal health: HIV, SARS-CoV-2, flu, ASFV, FMDV.

Dr. Ferretti’s seminal work on digital contact tracing and COVID-19 epidemiology at the beginning of the pandemic provided the key evidence and the epidemiological rationale for the development of contact-tracing apps around the world. His research has been pivotal for the creation of the Google/Apple Exposure Notification framework, and he advised the Italian government for its development of the first app in the world based on this approach. He has advised the Department of Health and Social Care of the UK government, actively supported the deployment and evaluation of the highly successful COVID-19 NHS app within the NHS Test&Trace program, produced the first large-scale evidence of the epidemiological impact of exposure notification apps, and supported the development of contact-tracing apps in many other countries. He is passionate about designing, improving, implementing and evaluating public health interventions in preparation for future outbreaks, including novel options for precision epidemiology and epidemic management and control.