Dr. Michael Baker is an infectious disease epidemiologist and public health physician at the University of Otago in Wellington, New Zealand.
He has served as a member of the New Zealand Ministry of Health’s Covid-19 Technical Advisory Group and has been a leading architect and advocate for the Covid-19 elimination strategy. He established a programme of research on the epidemiology, prevention and control of Covid-19 in New Zealand and internationally (Co-Search), which has generated a large amount of published research and commentary aimed at improving the pandemic response.
His research areas of focus include infectious disease epidemiology; the COVID‑19 pandemic, including the elimination strategy and control measures; emerging infectious diseases; food safety and enteric diseases; zoonoses and One Health; immunisation and vaccine preventable diseases; rheumatic fever, skin infections, chronic effects of infectious diseases.
Dr. Baker took part in the August 22 WSWS webinar, “For a global strategy to stop the pandemic and save lives!”
Dr. Deepti Gurdasani is one of the world’s leading experts on COVID-19. She is one of the lead authors of the BMJ article condemning the UK government’s promotion of “herd immunity through mass infection,” calling its actions a “dangerous and unethical experiment.”
With a background in clinical epidemiology and statistical genetics, Dr. Gurdasani received her medical degree in internal medicine at Christian Medical College, Vellore, India. Her doctoral work, completed in 2013, examined genetic factors associated with disease in genetically diverse populations. Specifically, she developed machine-learning algorithms for large-scale clinical data sets.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Gurdasani has provided indispensable information and public commentary on the pandemic, becoming a harsh critic of governments and their criminal response to the public health crisis. She has used her Twitter account and the media to share information on the evolving situation. Her work on exposing the connection between school-aged children in community transmission and research on the incidence of Long COVID have been of great service to the public. She has also been involved with the COVID Action Group, a multidisciplinary global network of experts with the stated mission to eliminate COVID-19.
Further reading:
“This is a virus that we need to eliminate”—Dr. Deepti Gurdasani condemns “herd immunity” policies
Dr. Malgorzata (Gosia) Gasperowicz is a developmental biologist and a researcher at the Faculty of Nursing at the University of Calgary. She earned her Master’s at the Intercollegiate Faculty of Biotechnology in Gdansk, Poland and a Ph.D.in biology at Albert Ludvig University of Freiburg, Germany.
Dr. Gasperowicz is a co-founder of ZeroCOVIDCanada, a member of COVIDisAirborne, and a member of the World Health Network (WHN). Since the pandemic’s beginning, she has been analyzing the dynamics of the SARS-CoV-2 spread and communicating this scientific understanding to the public via social and traditional media. She also advocates for better pandemic-response policies.
Recommended articles and videos:
Interview with Dr. Malgorzata Gasperowicz: “We have to aim for global eradication!”
Dr. Gasperowicz on the scientific measures needed to eradicate COVID-19
Dr. Jose-Luis Jimenez is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He is the Institute Fellow at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES). His expertise is in aerosol physics and atmospheric chemistry, mathematical modeling, and disease transmission.
Dr. Jimenez was one of the 239 signatories last year of an open letter to the World Health Organization (WHO) and Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) urging them to acknowledge that airborne aerosols are critical in the transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
With 20 years of experience in studying aerosols, Dr. Jimenez used social media channels to warn the public, providing scientific knowledge of aerosol transmission of respiratory pathogens.
Further reading:
Dr. Eric Feigl-Ding is an epidemiologist and health economist, and a Senior Fellow at the Federation of American Scientists. He earned a Doctor of Science in epidemiology and in nutrition at Harvard University, and was formerly a faculty member and researcher at Harvard Medical School and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Dr. Feigl-Ding was one of the earliest public health experts to warn of the dangers of COVID-19, with a tweet in late January going viral that made clear the immense dangers posed by the coronavirus. He has been interviewed in the press many times throughout the pandemic, emphasizing the need for vaccinations and strong public health measures to contain the virus.
Further reading:
Dr. Eric Feigl-Ding: Exposing children to COVID is “dangerous and morally reprehensible”
Epidemiologist Eric Feigl-Ding calls CDC’s mask reversal a “mess”
Dr. Joe Vipond is an emergency physician who practises at the Foothills Medical Centre in Calgary, Canada. He is a member of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment.
Dr. Howard Ehrman, is a retired family medicine physician and was an assistant professor at the University of Illinois, College of Medicine. He also has a masters in public health.
Lisa Diaz is a parent in the UK who is a founding member of SafeEdForAll and a member of the UK Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee. Diaz played a leading role in organizing the October 1 global school strike against the reckless reopening of schools to in-person learning.
Recommended video:
UK parent Lisa Diaz discusses October 1 school strike and the fight to eradicate COVID-19
David O’Sullivan is a London bus driver who was fired for defending his colleagues’ right to a safe workplace during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Read more about David and the campaign for his reinstatement here.
David North is the Chairman of the International Editorial Board of the World Socialist Web Site and the National Chairman of the Socialist Equality Party in the United States. He is the author of many books, including A Quarter Century of War, The Russian Revolution and the Unfinished 20th Century, and In Defense of Leon Trotsky. North has written extensively on the pandemic and its implications for the World Socialist Web Site.