Tuesday, July 6, 2021, 11:30 AM – 1 PM EDT
Susan Allen, MD, MPH, Professor, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, and Eric Hunter, PhD, Professor, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
“A 35-Year History of HIV Research in Africa: Epidemiology, Transmission, Co-Factors and Vaccine Development”
Our speakers today, Susan Allen and Eric Hunter, have been “teamed up” not only since they wed, long ago now, but also since they began their work on HIV and other infectious diseases in Africa, long ago as well. She, an MD/MPH epidemiologist and founding director of the Rwanda Zambia Health Research Group (RZHRG) based at Emory, and he, a PhD virologist and immunologist at the Emory Vaccine Center, have spent more than 30 years both conducting research, in the field and in their Emory labs, and helping to implement the results of their research (saving many thousands of lives) at some of the most challenging clinical sites imaginable.. The two are in Africa, being menaced by a volcano, even as we post this description of the talk they will offer us when they return. But of course, that volcano may not faze people who had to flee the genocide in Rwanda in 1994 . . . We look forward to hearing Susan and Eric share the exciting story of their intertwined personal and professional lives. As Susan puts it in her most recent email: “science, politics, history, the bigger picture of developments in HIV and other health issues in Africa, and hilarious [as well as harrowing] anecdotes in store.”