Full Professor, Political Studies
Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ottawa
As soon as governments became aware of the severity of COVID-19, most have promoted social distancing measures. This included cancelling or limiting attendance at sporting events, concerts, and other collective meetings where large groups converge. The rationale for these decisions has been to prevent what epidemiologists call ‘superspreading events (SSEs)’, or large infection clusters.
Science fiction is one of the means of representation of science in modern societies, in a way that is distinct from the representational modes of teaching, popularization, institutionalization, and politics.
Senior Fellow, ISSP, uOttawa
Senior Fellow, University of Alberta’s China Institute
Distinguished Fellow with the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada
The coronavirus is bringing to international attention the Chinese government’s disregard for transparency and the individual human rights of its citizens.
It’s no secret that debates over Canada’s energy and climate future are divisive and contentious — if not outright polarized. There is no common vision for the country’s energy future in an age of climate change. Could COVID-19 change that?
Author: Prof. Susan Aaronson and Prof. Patrick Leblond
Professor, Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University
Director of the Digital Trade and Data Governance Hub
Faculty Affiliate, ISSP
Associate Professor, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs and CN – Paul M. Tellier Chair on Business and Public Policy, uOttawa
Personal data has become essential both to mitigate COVID-19 and to rescue our slowing economy. For example, Google is using its large trove of personal data to track the effectiveness of social distancing. Firms are also using personal data to supply us with goods and services from toilet paper to in-home meetings. Meanwhile, policymakers are using personal data to provide individuals with stimulus checks and unemployment insurance.
Author: Prof. Kelly Bronson and Prof. Robert Smith?
Core Member and Inclusive Innovation Research Cluster Co-Lead, ISSP
Assistant Professor, Faculty of Social Sciences, uOttawa
Faculty Affiliate, ISSP
Full Professor, Disease Modelling, Faculty of Science, uOttawa
On April the 3rd, CBC news ran a story with the headline, “COVID-19 could kill 3,000 to 15,000 people in Ontario, provincial modelling shows.” What does this vastly wide range of future scenarios say about disease modelling? And what does the fact that this wide range made news say about the place of modelling in policy and culture?
Advisory Council Member, ISSP, uOttawa
Guest Scholar, Centre de recherche en droit public, Université de Montréal
Former Deputy Minister of Health for Canada from 1993 to 1998
I would like to offer some reflections agreed upon on my experience as a former Deputy Minister of Health for Canada from 1993 to 1998. During this period, I experienced the Krever survey on contaminated blood, the redesign of the Canadian tobacco law, the aftermath of the Baird report on new reproductive technologies, the impact on Canada of a plague outbreak in India and Ebola in Nigeria.
The world has not known, in living memory, a pandemic on the scale of what we are experiencing with COVID-19. Nor has the world had access to data and analysis, much of it being generated rapidly and disseminated freely, on the SARS-CoV-2 virus itself. Navigating a path out of this crisis will require effective integration of this data into decision making.
Core Member and Lead of the ISSP Robotics and Artificial Intelligence Research Cluster
Assistant Professor, School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Faculty of Engineering, uOttawa
We are all participating in an unprecedented global experiment aimed at figuring out what is the best way to confront the COVID-19 pandemic. And according to the latest data, one well-established strategy seems to be working; the messaging around social distancing seems to be motivating most Canadians in just the right way: we’re flattening the curve.
Up to the week prior to its publication, there was increasing public pressure for the federal and provincial governments to be more open about their projections of the COVID-19 epidemic curves, especially the numbers of cases, deaths, and hospitalizations, and how these trends were likely to affect hospital capacity including ICU beds and ventilators.
The opinions expressed in these articles are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the ISSP or its staff.
