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Abraar Karan Profile picture
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9 Apr, 6 tweets, 3 min read
Was invited to speak next week, & I’m looking forward to it—but I cannot imagine giving this talk without referring to @seyeabimbola seminal paper on the foreign pose & foreign gaze in global health. This will frame much of the discussion. Read it.

gh.bmj.com/content/4/5/e0…
2/ As I think about this talk- an Indian born, American doctor giving a talk to a number of American researchers about why the way we approach global health can be deeply problematic, can think more about how to classify this talk in terms of foreign/local - pose/gaze
3/ Would then also ask us to consider how different the talk would be if we had a researcher from a non-American context speak to this same audience about these topics; the pose would be very different; it would offer something critically important—would urge @ceid_uga to do this
4/ I am happy to offer my perspective as an Indian-American who has spent significant time in India, has worked with American students in India as well; but have also occupied a foreign role in other contexts where I was the “American global health person”
5/ And certainly and inadvertently have contributed myself to some of what I today identify as problematic; from this, I ask how I and we can all be better & do better in this space. More to come, hoping for an interesting conversation. Will also pull in some thoughts from...
6/ @Real_Ironist book “Epidemic Illusions” & from the writings of @paimadhu @DrMishalK & many others.

More than anything, hope to see other speakers be invited to lead this space; my perspective will be a single one among many others that can offer more.
mitpress.mit.edu/books/epidemic…

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More from @AbraarKaran

Abraar Karan Profile picture
7 Apr
🧵🧵Australian church choir singer #covid19 outbreak now in CDC EID
———
•no masks
•no ventilation systems
•transmission >50 feet—> airborne
•confirmed via genome sequencing
•12 secondary cases detected out of 508 (2.4%), although only 434 were tested

Source: CDC EID journal
2/ So the index case was a choir singer who started to feel sick on July 16th; sang at four 1 hour services on the 16th & 17th from a choir loft elevated 11.5 feet above the congregation #covid19
3/ The secondary cases reported no other contact with the singer.

Video recordings were also used to confirm their seating positions relative to the index case as well. #covid19
Read 10 tweets
Abraar Karan Profile picture
5 Apr
🧵1/ This is a tragic story in @washingtonpost — we have seen, treated, & continue to treat many cases just like this.

When people share their tragedy, they are sacrificing to remind us all that the epidemic is not just numbers; those numbers are people. They are families. Image
2/ Who do we blame?

Many who got sick *couldn’t avoid it*- they weren’t protected.

Others had the privilege to avoid risk- worked from home, had $ etc.

And some blatantly chose to actively go against advice like wearing a mask, hurting themselves & others.
3/ The piece here specifically implicates the latter groups- where there is some truth to the idea that people’s choices contributed to spread. How much is unclear- partly because many infections are actually in the former group- that couldn’t stay home, that worked frontline etc
Read 5 tweets
Abraar Karan Profile picture
4 Apr
🧵1/ In a pandemic, we have two urgent interests: that life saving vaccines/ treatments be created, manufactured, & distributed, and that the disease be quickly contained/eliminated worldwide without a potentially catastrophic resurgence. #covid19
blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2021/04/02…
2/ The financial interests of pharmaceutical shareholders accord with our first interest, but not always with the second.

Product allocations go to the highest bidders, rather than to where need is greatest or the pandemic may be contained most effectively. @ThomasPogge
3/ The system as it stands is designed to fail, because public health is a secondary goal behind financial recuperation & explicitly financial profit

In a pandemic, it can’t be that way.

But I don’t need to tell you all this- you have been watching it unfold already. #covid19
Read 10 tweets
Abraar Karan Profile picture
1 Apr
“While more than six million of the country’s 18 million people have been vaccinated, a surge in infections has left intensive-care units operating with few beds to spare and the system at a breaking point.” From Chile @nytimes
#covid19

nytimes.com/2021/03/30/wor…
2/ “Dr. Francisca Crispi, a regional president of Chile’s medical association, said that 20 to 30 percent of medical professionals in the country had gone on leave because they are so exhausted.”
3/ “No one questions that the vaccination campaign is a success story,” she said. “But it conveyed a false sense of security to people, who felt that since we’re all being vaccinated the pandemic is over.”
Read 4 tweets
Abraar Karan Profile picture
30 Mar
1/ Sharing new piece: we have learned a lot this year about the deficiencies of the ‘test,trace, isolate’ system, but it is still going to be needed to burn out the epidemic once case numbers are brought down further.

W/ @RanuDhillon
@washingtonpost
washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/0… Image
2/ With most of the focus on 💉💉 right now (as it should be)— our other pandemic tools like Test, Trace, Isolate (TTI) have taken a backseat.

Yet, they are still crucial to stopping the #covid19 epidemic- but we need to do each of them better.
3/ Having this infrastructure in place will be essential for future infectious disease outbreaks/pandemics.

I expect TTI will become especially relevant again this summer to stop ongoing transmission chains once we have vaccinated a majority of country

Cc @cshea4 @PostOpinions
Read 4 tweets
Abraar Karan Profile picture
29 Mar
Hoping for less deadly surges

1/ An important piece of the puzzle that some have pointed to: 49% of 65+ in our country have been *fully vaxx*; 73% have received at least 1 dose

We know age is single most significant risk factor in mortality. #covid19

covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tra…
2/ While proposed plans to simply isolate the elderly are largely unachievable/ not how societies fundamentally function-- what many of us do agree on is that vaccinating the elderly as a priority group is critical; and we are doing it well.

cdc.gov/coronavirus/20…
3/ With real world data from @CDCMMWR today showing significant protection even 2 weeks after just the 1st dose of mRNA vaccines, I am optimistic that we should see a further notable reduction in mortality even w/ subsequent #covid19 surges

Read 5 tweets

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