Pandemic Response Conference – 6/23-6/24

The Harvard-MIT Center for Regulatory Science is delighted to invite you to a virtual conference entitled Pandemic Response: Resilience and Recovery in the Era of COVID-19, to be held on June 23-24, 2020.

Among other esteemed speakers, the conference features members of PanFab, including Peter Sorger, Nicole LeBoeuf, and Deborah Plana.

Register here and we look forward to your participation!
Overview

This two-day virtual conference will explore issues involving resilience and recovery to COVID19 and other related emergencies. We focus on responsibilities, policies and activities involved in responses to COVID19 from infection control to therapeutic discovery. The conference will help to inform government officials, healthcare administrators, physicians, biomedical research scientists and concerned citizens.

The COVID-19 pandemic has not only been a tragedy for individual patients, it has revealed multiple vulnerabilities at institutional and local responses and profound failure nationally. Recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic will involve both emergency adaptations and long-term changes to the way we plan for and respond to pandemics. Among the challenges we face are an emphasis on very low cost over supply chain resiliency; single points of failure in the national response to testing and infection control; a lack of innovation in medical equipment such as personal protective equipment; and the need for more efficient ways to test therapies and vaccines.

Day 1: Case Studies in Pandemic Response by the Students and Fellows of the Greater Boston Pandemic Fabrication Team; June 23 | 10am-4pm

Day One of the conference will involve short presentations from the student engineer-scientists and local fabricators who have participated in the Greater Boston Pandemic Fabrication Team and innovated in the delivery of personal protective equipment.

Presentations by PanFab members and their collaborators:

  • Rapid prototyping and alternative manufacturing of PPE
  • Regulatory innovations to improve pandemic response
  • Deployment of non-traditional PPE and low-risk medical products

Day 2: COVID-19 Response at the Local and National Scale; June 24 | 12pm-3:30pm

Day Two will feature short presentations and panel discussions by academic, government, healthcare and industry leaders with expertise in trust and resiliency, medical devices, and therapeutic development.

  • Rapid Therapeutic Development: Repurposing drugs and developing vaccines
  • Resiliency and Trust: Local, regional, and national response to PPE Shortages
If you have any questions reach out to hits_regsci@hms.harvard.edu.