News

The School is proud to announce that Associate Professor Hsu Li Yang and Adjunct Associate Professor Jeremy Lim have been jointly appointed as Co-Directors of the Leadership Institute for Global Health Transformation (LIGHT), with effect from 1 September 2019. LIGHT was established in 2016 to address global health issues that are relevant to Singapore and the School’s regional partners. It aims to be a platform to encourage cross-fertilisation of ideas, as well as support international collaborations to facilitate evidence-based solutions that deliver measurable public health impact to Singapore and acrossRead more

The most common reasons for low vaccination take-up rates, which are similar across most high-income countries in the context of influenza vaccines, are lack of recommendation by healthcare providers, lack of knowledge (including misconceptions) about influenza and influenza vaccines, concerns about vaccine efficacy and side effects, and lack of opportunities for vaccination. Associate Professor Hsu Li Yang, Programme Leader (Infectious Diseases), and Associate Professor Alex Cook, Vice Dean (Research), suggest a multipronged approach to improve adult vaccination coverage in Singapore. These include running recurrent, consistent and targeted education campaigns toRead more

There have been over 9,700 cases of dengue reported since the start of 2019, five times more than the number seen this time last year and more than double the total cases for all of 2017. This increase is across Southeast Asia, with several neighbouring countries also reporting a sharp rise in dengue infections this year. Assistant Professor Vincent Pang, Director, Centre for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Research (CIDER), and Associate Professor Lim Poh Lian, Senior Consultant, National Centre for Infectious Diseases, explain the different drivers in dengue epidemics. Firstly,Read more

More than 700 doctors, data scientists, data engineers, software engineers and innovators gathered at the Healthcare AI Datathon and Expo 2019 to explore how artificial intelligence (AI) can be used to tackle healthcare challenges. Jointly organised by the School, National University Health System (NUHS) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the event held on 17-21 July comprised conferences, seminars, workshops and exhibitions featuring prototypes using machine learning algorithms to improve patient outcomes. Event highlights video from NUHS The Datathon held on 19-21 July brought together clinicians, data scientists and statisticiansRead more

On 28 July, the HealthySG taskforce proposed that vaccination subsidies be given to Singaporean adults and Permanent Residents to protect themselves against vaccine-preventable diseases. According to data from the Ministry of Health, the take-up rate for the influenza vaccine is 12 to 14 percent among adults. Among elderly aged 65 to 74 years, the rate is 14 per cent, which is worrying as seniors tend to have weaker immune systems that make it harder for them to fight off infections and also cause them to be more prone to complications.Read more

Warmer temperatures enhance the growth of mosquito larvae and cause them to grow into adult mosquitoes faster, said Assistant Professor Vincent Pang, Director, Centre for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Research (CIDER). “Some studies showed that warmer temperatures may also increase the number of eggs laid per mosquito,” he added. In addition to hot weather and the increase in Aedes mosquito population, low herd immunity could also be one of the main reasons for the spike in cases this year. Professor Leo Yee Sin, Executive Director of the National Centre forRead more

To understand the current dengue outbreak, Associate Professor Alex Cook, Vice Dean (Research), revisits the situation in the years following Singapore’s independence and explains how the virus was limited in its transmission in the next few decades. Fifty years ago, it was limited by number of people to infect, as most people had already been infected and were immune to the virus. As the country developed one of the world’s best vector control programmes, transmission was limited by availability of both people and mosquitoes to infect. Over the years, itRead more

Singapore is seeing one of the worst dengue seasons in several years, with more cases so far this year than the last two years combined. Assistant Professor Vincent Pang, Director, Centre for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Research (CIDER), attributed the rise of dengue clusters in certain areas to three factors: 1) greater clustering of households within a residential area, 2) low cluster herd immunity, and 3) high frequency of residents travelling to dengue-endemic countries such as Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. He added that areas with a greater numberRead more

On 15-18 July 2019, a delegation of nine SSHSPH faculty members travelled to Vientiane, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, to learn more about the public health issues facing the country, as well as how the Lao people are working towards overcoming them. They were joined by two members of Thailand’s Health Intervention and Technology Assessment Program (HITAP). The group was hosted by Dr Sengchanh Kounnavong, Director of the Lao Tropical and Public Health Institute. They also had the opportunity to visit the National Tuberculosis Centre, Nutrition Center and Maternal & ChildRead more

Held on 24-28 June, the NUS Initiative to Improve Health in Asia Leadership Development Programme (NIHA LDP) 2019 was organised by the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, and co-hosted by National Health Foundation Thailand, the Access and Delivery Partnership (ADP) and the International Decision Support Initiative (iDSI). More than 70 senior regulators, health policymakers and practitioners from 18 countries took part in the programme with the theme ‘Advancing Universal Health Coverage (UHC) through the use of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) for health care priority setting and reimbursement’. The programme coveredRead more

Faculty, alumni, current students and graduands gathered on 11 July for an evening of reunion and celebration at SSHSPH AlumNite 2019 held at Park Avenue Rochester Hotel. Vice Dean (Education), Associate Professor Jeannette Lee addressed the graduands, congratulating them on their achievements and for completing their studies. She also shared her hopes that they would stay in touch and return for future AlumNites, this time as alumni. This year, alumna Ms Petrina Ho (MPH ’12) was invited to share about her SSHSPH education and public health experience. Ms Ho isRead more

The NUS-NUHS-MIT Healthcare AI Datathon and Expo 2019 will be held this week from 17 to 21 July 2019. Assistant Professor ‘Mornin’ Feng Mengling is leading the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Datathon segment for the third year now. He talks to us about some of the successes of the past two years and more broadly about his work at the School. Pictured above is Mornin (1st from right) at last year’s Datathon Tell us more about the AI Datathon. To be successful in healthcare computer science, there needs to be closeRead more