Day 6

Sharing experiences and decisions

Groups will present their results to the whole School, on Saturday, 22th July. More than one more member of the group can present. Presentations should last 15 minutes at maximum followed by a 10-minute discussion. The target public are your fellow students, which are not familiar with your assignment.

How to send you presentation slides

• The final version of presentation slides should be sent as an attached file in PDF format to spsas2023@gmail.com
• The deadline for sending the final version of this PDF file is Saturday 22 July 08:00 AM.
• We will upload this version on the main computer in the auditorium, and this is the version that you should use use and we will discuss.

Day 5

Summary of context and strategies

The group should prepare a summary of the proposed responses and justify what evidence and factors were taken into account.  This summary should be organized in a 15 minute presentation that will be presented on Saturday, 22th July. We encourage you to be creative, clear, concise, and consider that you are presenting to the entire School. This is an opportunity to have valuable feedback from your colleagues and faculty after an intense 5-days immersion into a situation room.

By the end of the day today you should present a preliminary version of Saturday’s presentation to  the instructors. The instructors will visit the group’s room to give some feedback between 3 PM and 5 PM.

How to send you presentation slides

• The final version of presentation slides should be sent as an attached file in PDF format to spsas2023@gmail.com
• The deadline for sending the final version of this PDF file is Saturday 22 July 08:00 AM.
• We will upload this version on the main computer in the auditorium, and this is the version that you should use use and we will discuss.

Day 4

Deciding which intervention is worth adopting 

After 12 months of the public health emergency.

A vaccine against this specific strain Flu A is not available yet. As it is a new manufacturing platform for the vaccine synthesis, this new immunobiologic has not yet been approved by ANVISA (Brazilian Agency for the Evaluation of Medicines) although clinical trials have been published with positive results. Also, a big university research group is planning a study and has reached out to you.

The municipality has routine vaccination of the elderly and children in health centers for other strains of Influenza. There is a small stock of vaccines whose composition refers to the strains that circulated in the previous year.

Questions to consider

• Which information about those vaccines are essential to effective implementation and for logistics to achieve the greatest impact in the municipality? Are there reliable alternatives?
• Which logistic possibilities are available to organize a vaccination campaign to target groups?
• What information could contribute to a better monitoring of the vaccination and future impacts? How to deal with vaccine hesitancy?
• Which other prevention measures could be implemented to lower the transmission in the community?
• Which questions would you want to be answered in partnership with the university?

What is expected of the group on day 4

Propose paths and responses based on a broader and more critical knowledge of the facts that arise during the health crisis.

Day 3

Political and Logistical Challenges

After 6 months of the beginning of the epidemic.

Situation: It is an infection by Influenza A virus, with a new strain detected. Lack of hospital and ICU beds.

There is a high incidence of factory workers. Cases are particularly more severe in working-age adults and their families.

The mayor and the group of councilors do not accept the control measures and do not believe in the seriousness of the situation, as they damage the image of the municipal administration. They make a statement denying the briefing made by the technical group. They decide to keep the factory open and get 50 more workers to continue the construction project. Councilors support the mayor’s policies due to fear of losing local investment.

Questions to consider

• How should the team respond to this situation in order to avoid more cases, hospitalizations, and deaths?
• How can the situation room work more effectively with stakeholders and other important actors, in order to reduce  cases, hospitalizations, and deaths?
• Which strategies can enhance community awareness and engagement in the response to the outbreak?
• What could be effective strategies to address logistic challenges, like the lack of beds?
• Which communication strategies can be used in this context?

What is expected of the group on day 3

Tackle the political and logistical issues in this health crisis situation. Aim for creativity and flexibility in designing mitigation actions that are politically and logistically feasible.

Day 2

Describing the current situation

The only information available at the time is the dataset that contains daily SARI (Severe acute respiratory infections) data for various regions of the city. Each row represents a single individual and includes information such as the date of symptoms onset, age, sex, pregnancy, neighborhood, ICU, and outcome. There is also information about HDI in the neighborhood of the patient’s residence.

The etiological research (Day 1) indicated that it is an infection by an Influenza A virus of avian origin, of a strain not circulating in the human population in the country. Airborne transmission by droplets and aerosols has already been confirmed.

The main symptoms presented by patients are fever (90%), headache (75%), cough (80%), myalgia (75%), and hypotension (30%). The variable “comorbidity” includes obesity, chronic pulmonary disease, and cardiovascular disease.

Database available

Map file: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w6ob37eNedAHsek7VOjgdk0bZGPDmr09/view?usp=sharing

Disease data: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NG878cMqfUimKN-6wwlwjwoFzsigWMNo/view?usp=sharing

Questions to consider

• Which groups or regions are most affected?
• Which strategies are priorities?
• What indicators can contribute to monitoring and coping with the epidemic and risk of cases?

What is expected from the group on day 2:

Analyze data to identify priorities, and population groups at risk, and to support future decision-making.

Day 1

A new disease

The news has just arrived at the municipal health department of a city of 40,000 inhabitants. Ten cases of a respiratory disease (atypical pneumonia) and 2 deaths occurred in a week, in a construction site on the outskirts of the town. More than 100 workers from different parts of the country are taking part in the construction of an asphalt plant. They live in an accommodation in the center of the city. Some of them came with their families.

The city has 4 health centers, an emergency room, and a low-complexity hospitalization unit with 20 beds.

After 1 week, 30 more cases and 2 deaths were registered. Many cases progressed to respiratory failure, increasing occupation in the emergency room and in the inpatient unit.

Questions to consider

• What are the first steps to investigate the problem?
• How to organize the mitigation of this health crisis?
• What are the indicators of interest to monitor and organize a strategy to control the situation?
• What are the research priorities that should be proposed to answer immediate strategic questions for understanding the dynamics of the disease?

What is expected of the group on Day 1

Organization of the group to broaden the understanding of the situation and start the discussion about the first steps to guarantee actions with an impact in the future.