ECDC: On Air

This week we sit down with ECDC expert in community preparedness, Svetla Tsolova, to talk about how local communities can help in infectious disease prevention and control. Is it difficult to train the communities in emergency preparedness? Are they an important part of the machine that needs constant oiling? Svetla responds to our questions and goes deeper into the topic, presenting some of the m...

On today's episode, we speak with Paul Riley - ECDC's expert on preparedness, specialising in biosecurity and biosafety. Paul points out the difference between the two terms, recalls some of the scariest moments of recent history of bioterrorist attacks and navigates us through the various ways we are protected from biological threats on all levels. For more information about ECDC, please visit ec...

Agoritsa Baka joins us once again to discuss the ongoing monkeypox outbreak that has seen large numbers of cases in Europe. Agoritsa explains what monkeypox is, where it comes from, and what you can do to keep safe.  You can find all of ECDC's resources on monkeypox here . For more information on ECDC please visit ecdc.europa.eu . You can also follow us on social media for the latest news.&nb...

On today's episode, Principal Expert in Hepatitis, Erika Duffell, gives us a bit of background on what hepatitis is, and discusses the most up to date information on the ongoing hepatitis outbreak affecting children. You can find the latest situation updates on the ongoing hepatitis outbreak here , and more information on hepatitis in general here . For more news and information please visit ecdc....

In this episode, we speak with Lara Payne-Hallström, ECDC expert on Legionnaires’ disease. Lara explains what this disease is, where its name comes from, and how and why ECDC monitors it.  She also tells us how she got interested in this disease in particular, and gives us all the details on where the bacteria grows and develops. You can find out more about Legionnaires’ disease here. For more new...

Today ECDC has a special episode on the recent salmonella outbreak linked to chocolate products in Europe. Principle Expert in Food and Waterborne Diseases, Johanna Takkinen, speaks to us about what salmonella is, where it comes from, how it can spread, and what symptoms to look for.  You can find ECDC's Epidemoloigical Update related to salmonella (with links to national food safety authorit...

On today's episode, we speak with Dr Piotr Kramarz as he discusses his recent field mission to Poland, and working with the Polish health authorities to assist the large numbers of Ukrainian refugees.  You can find more information about ECDC's on the Ukrainian crisis here and here .  For more information about ECDC, please visit ecdc.europa.eu , or follow us on Social Media .

In recognition of World Tuberculosis day on March 24th , we will be hearing from Rob van Hest, Public Health TB Control Physician and Epidemiologist in the Regional Public Health Service of Groningen, Netherlands. Rob has extensive experience in TB screening and treatment, especially among urban risk groups such as the homeless and high-risk drug users, as well as asylum seekers. You will hear Rob...

On today's episode, we speak with Laura Espinosa, Epidemic Intelligence Expert at ECDC, about Epitweetr. This tool allows users to automatically monitor trends of tweets with the aim of detecting public health threats early. It was designed to support public health experts with the early detection of threats from infectious diseases but can be extended to all hazards and other fields of study by m...

In this episode, ECDC expert Cornelia Adlhoch talks all about avian influenza – how it spreads, how much of a threat it poses to humans, and the ‘cathedral silence’ that farmers sometimes experience when walking into an infected chicken coop. Learn more about avian flu on ECDC pages here too: https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/avian-influenza

In this episode, we are joined by René Niehus, Expert in Mathematical Modelling, in order to find out more about how ECDC uses models in public health. We get to understand the different kinds of data that can go into models, and how continually analysing new data can build better models in the future.  You can find more information on the COVID-19 Forecasting Hub here . You can find more inf...

On today's episode, we sit down with Julien Beauté, Expert in General Surveillance. We discuss ECDC's surveillance activities and how the surveillance process works from collection to output for diseases such as measles, HIV, and of course more recently COVID-19.  To find out more about ECDC's surveillance data, please click here . For more general information on ECDC please visit ecdc.europa...

The 31st of December 2019 began as normal for Jordi Borrell Pique, the Epidemic Intelligence Officer on duty for ECDC. Soon, media reports began to arrive of patients showing signs of a ‘pneumonia of unknown etiology’ linked to a wet market in Wuhan. For this episode, we sit down with Jordi to recount those early days of COVID-19 at ECDC and remember how quickly things changed. For more informatio...

In today's episode we speak with Teymur Noori, HIV/AIDS expert at ECDC. Teymur explains what the HIV/AIDS situation looks like in Europe, which populations and regions are most affected, and what goals that have been set, and how to reach them.  Find out more via ecdc.europa.eu/en/hiv-infection-and-aids

In this episode we chat with Olivier Briet, expert on mosquito-borne diseases. He tells us more about which diseases are transmitted by mosquitoes, what effect climate change has on the spread of diseases, and what ECDC does to monitor their spread. As always, you can find more information on this topic on our website: ecdc.europa.eu

On this episode, we speak with Pasi Penttinen, ECDC expert on coronavirus and influenza. Pasi discusses the reasons why there have been hardly any cases of flu recently, what to expect from the upcoming flu season, and whether the COVID-19 pandemic is really ‘just like a bad flu season’. “In the worst years, we have more than 200,000 people dying in Europe as a result of influenza. Is this really...

This week we once again sat down with Director Dr Andrea Ammon to discuss ECDC’s appearance at the European Health Forum Gastein, and in particular ECDC’s session on community engagement for health emergencies. Excerpts from the session are included in this episode; information on the speakers can be found here . ECDC’s work on community engagement can be found here . More information on the Europ...

In this episode, we sit down with Tarik Derrough - Expert in vaccine-preventable diseases - to talk about ECDC's role in coordinating disease and laboratory networks. These networks bring together experts to collaborate on various topics. We focus one type of network in particular - National Immunization Technical Advisory Groups or NITAGs - which provide technical resources, supply guidance, and...

September 7th is World Field Epidemiology Day so we sat down with Adam Roth, Head of Fellowship Programmes at ECDC to talk about what field epidemiology is, and about the fellowship pathways, EPIET and EUPHEM , that ECDC offers. "This is intervention epidemiology, it should make a difference." More information on TEPHINET is available here .

In this episode, we speak with John Kinsman, who is an expert in behavioural change at ECDC. John talks about vaccine hesitancy, the spread of health misinformation and what public health institutions can do to counter misinformation. For more information on vaccines, please visit the European Vaccine Information Portal .  “Vaccine hesitancy isn’t always the result of misinformation, there ar...

On this episode, we discuss the importance of vaccines, a little bit about their history, the role ECDC plays when it comes to vaccines monitoring and scheduling in Europe and how vaccines help fight not only COVID-19, but also other diseases with Dr Piotr Kramarz - Deputy Chief Scientist at ECDC. "Vaccination is like a self-defense class for our bodies." For more information on vaccine schedules...

For this episode, we look into how well prepared can we be for public health threats with Dr Agoritsa Baka - public health preparedness expert at ECDC.  "You need to be able to talk and engage with your community"

For the second episode, we look at epidemiological signals with Dr Thomas Mollet - group lead for the ECDC Epidemic Intelligence team, and how important these signals can be in detecting outbreaks.  "We are basically hunters of information.”

To begin this audio series, we chat with the ECDC Director, Dr Andrea Ammon on ECDC's past, present and future and what the current pandemic can bring into the European overview of infectious diseases.  "Like building an aeroplane while you're flying."

A peek behind the scenes at the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control - the EU agency that aims to identify, assess and communicate current and emerging threats to human health posed by infectious diseases in Europe.