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The primary goals of the Symposium were to raise awareness of the rich set of COVID-19 research projects and their methodologies underway across BC on the public and population health response and its impacts as well as health services and social sciences/humanities research and to encourage collaboration as well as identify and address challenges to the research. Much of this research has been recently funded, is being undertaken as a “pivot” from other research projects, or is underway even though unfunded. Therefore, the Symposium was not “results” focused, but was instead focused on identifying synergies across planned/early-stage research. The main sessions, taking place from Sept 1st to 2nd, focused on highlighting research funded by CIHR, MSFHR, and Genome Canada/BC.

The objectives of the symposium were to:

1. Share the broad range of research being conducted across BC on population and public health, health services and other impacts of COVID-19 to stimulate discussions around synergies and research gaps;
2. Learn how this research can inform and support the BC Ministry of Health’s COVID-19 strategic priorities and the BC Strategic COVID-19 Research Framework; and
3. Discuss strategies for minimizing patient burden and the efficient use of data and support platforms that are available to COVID-19 researchers in BC.

The recordings of the sessions are provided by the BC Academic Health Science Network. Visit their website for more information, and for the entire symposium video playlist.

Day 1 Sessions:

Day 2 Sessions:

Anne-Marie Nicol
KT through professional practice role

Mark Brockman
Serological test for COVID-19 antibodies

Mark Brockman, Masa Niikura, Peter J Unrau
SARS-CoV-2 Rapid Research: Fast track isothermal viral diagnostics

Mark Brockman, Zabrina Brumme, Leonid Chindelevitch, Robert Holt, Mario Ostrowski, Victor Appay, George Gao, Bradley Jones, Zara Ndhlovu, Thumbi Ndung'u
Harnessing cross-reactive T cell receptors to eliminate latent HIV reservoirs

Scott Lear
Measuring Mental Well-being During a Pandemic Study

Kelley Lee, Julia Smith, Adam Kamradt-Scott, Catherine Worsnop, Caroline Coljin, Karen Grépin, Will Hsiao, Julianne Piper
Decision tools to inform adoption and lifting of crossborder measures during the COVID-19 pandemic and future global outbreak preparedness

Kelley Lee, Julia Smith, Clare Wenham, Ahmed Al-Rawi, Rosemary Morgan, Karen Grépin, Sophie Harman, Sara Davies
Understanding and mitigating real-time differential gendered effects of the COVID-19 outbreak

Kelley Lee, Adam Kamradt-Scott, Karen Grépin, Catherine Worsnop, Julianne Piper
Understanding non-compliance with the International Health Regulations (2005): Recommended strategies to inform and strengthen global coordination of the COVID-19 outbreak response

John O'Neil, Nguyen Vu Cong, Kanna Hayashi, Harry Minas, Jill Murphy, Will Small, Duc To, Nguyen Van Hoi
Implementation Research to Improve Scale-Up of Depression Services in Vietnam (IRIS-DSV)

Julia Smith
Gender and COVID-19

Zabrina Brumme, Don Kirkby, Chanson Brumme, Julio Montaner
Rapid release of an easily accessible SARS-CoV-2 genome analysis pipeline

Zabrina Brumme, Christopher Lowe, Jill Jackson, Chanson Brumme, Victor Leung, Nancy Matic, Julio Montaner, Gordon Ritchie, Marc Romney, Aleksandra Stefanovic
COVID19 test sensitivity:  Investigating COVID-19 test sensitivity using differential, research-based molecular methods

Zabrina Brumme, Christopher Lowe, Chanson Brumme, Nancy Matic, Julio Montaner, Gordon Ritchie, Aleksandra Stefanovic
Development of sensitive and quantitative molecular technologies for SARS-CoV-2 detection

Stuart Peacock, Helen McTaggert-Cowan, Mary de Vera
Understanding the experiences of individuals with immunosuppressive conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic (UNIFIED)

Stuart Peacock, Kim McGrail, Mike Burgess
Public Input into Pandemic Planning: deliberating trade-offs in COVID-19 planning

Meghan Winters, Caislin Firth
COHESION-BC Study: COvid-19, HEalth and Social InteractiOn in Neighbourhoods in British Columbia

Kate Tairyan
COVID-19 online course

Travis Salway, Joelle LeMoult, Gina McGowan, Harlan Pruden, Emily Rempel
Tailoring BC’s public health guidance for managing anxiety and depression in the context of COVID-19

Ralph Pantophlet, J.-P. Julien, S. Pöhlmann
Repurposing of anti-HIV antibodies to target the glycan shield of SARS-CoV-2

Ralph Pantophlet,
Preclinical development of an epitope-focused vaccine component against SARS-CoV-2

Ralph Pantophlet
Assessment of COVID-19 monoclonal antibodies and COVID-19 positive patient sera for neutralizing activity using a pseudovirus-based

Ruth Lavergne, Hasina Samji, Will Small, Tonia Nicholls, Christian Schutz
Access to mental health care in the context of COVID-19: Rapid analysis of population-based administrative data in British Columbia

Shira Goldenberg, Ruth Lavergne, Mei-ling Wiedmeyer
Is British Columbia’s COVID-19 response meeting the needs of im/migrants?

Kanna Hayashi, Kora Debeck, M-J Milloy, Cheyenne Johnson, Dean Wilson
Impacts of COVID-19 harm mitigation efforts on COVID-19 risk and health among people who use illicit drugs in Vancouver, BC

Beth Snow, Amy Salmon, Wei Zhang, Ihoghosa Iyamu
The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on clinical and non-clinical healthcare workers in the Lower Mainland

Lindsay Hedden, Ruth Lavergne, Rita McCracken, Ian Scott, Mei-ling Weidmeyer
Patterns of primary care in the context of COVID-19

Lindsay Hedden, Kendall Ho, Sandra Sundhu, Colleen McGavin, Helen Novak Lauscher
HealthLink BC Emergency iDoctor-in-assistance: Evaluating a new service responding to the pandemic

Sonya Cressman, Julia Smith, Rosemary Morgan, Colleen Allison, Carolie Colijn, Don Sin, Renelle Myers, Pat Camp 
A gender-accurate economic model for optimizing COVID-19 response policy

Hasina Samji, Matthew Carwana
Community partnership to mitigate harm from COVID-19 for vulnerable families, children and youth: deploying a social
pediatrics approach to measure gaps and define essential services

Shira Goldenberg, Ruth Lavergne, Mei-ling Wiedmeyer, Kate Shannon, Susitha Wanigaratne
Preventing and Mitigating the Impacts of COVID-19 Among Im/migrants in British Columbia: Rapid Mixed-Methods Data to Inform Policy and Programmes

Julian Somers, Stefanie Rezansoff, Angela Russolillo, Akm Moniruzzaman, Brittany Bingham
“Blind Spots”: People in Prison and Precarious Housing During COVID-19

Stuart Peacock, Murray Krahn, Girish Kulkarni
The Response of Provincial Health Systems to COVID-19: Service Provision and Costs Across Health Sectors, First Nations and other populations