Zachary Linhares/WashU

Neil Vora engages the audience with discussion of “spillover events.” (photo by Zachary Linhares/WashU Public Health)

WashU School of Public Health’s Solutions through Planetary Health Research (SPHERE) hosted a series of lectures and panels for WashU students, faculty, and local community members on Wednesday, Jan. 21, about the environmental risk factors associated with the spread of infectious disease. 

The keynote speakers were Felicia Keesing, the David and Rosalie Rose Distinguished Professor of Science, Mathematics, and Computing at Bard College, and Neil Vora, the executive director of Preventing Pandemics at the Source Coalition and orchestrator in residence at Integral Consulting. 

Keesing spoke about the necessity of biodiversity for preventing the spread of infectious disease, and Vora spoke about how deforestation and other interferences with nature can lead to “spillover events” that increase the likelihood of pandemics. The discussion was primarily centered on the systematic interconnectedness of human health with that of animals and the environment, as well as how policy can be used to solve this problem. 

Vora said he heard policymakers suggest that biodiversity was the leading cause of elevated pandemic risk, which shocked him. 

“My jaw dropped, but you have to engage accordingly in that — that is just a misunderstanding of where the risk comes from,” Vora said. “Rather, it is human activities that lead to a loss of biodiversity that creates that risk for spillovers, and there are a number of different mechanisms by which deforestation and land use change can drive that spillover.” 

Vora listed deforestation and forest degradation, poor biosecurity and animal husbandry, the commercial wildlife trade pipeline, and climate change as the key factors to consider.

Other speakers, moderators, and panelists included WashU faculty and other local academics, including co-directors of SPHERE, Dan Giammar, Christina Stallings, Solny Adalsteinsson, Nandini Raghuraman, and Douglas Luke. Associate Professor at the University of Missouri College of Veterinary Medicine and School of Health Professions, Ram K. Raghavan, and former Director for the City of St. Louis Department of Health, Mati Hlatshwayo Davis, were also panelists. 

Vora and the rest of the speakers were very solution-oriented, reflecting SPHERE’s approach as an initiative. Senior Network Manager of SPHERE, Jennifer Mandeville, said that she worked with Giammar to select people who would be able to “speak to a translational experience.”

“They’re excellent speakers, but they also think deeply about how that research moves out into impact,” Mandeville said. 

She was happy to hear the panelists and audience members engage in discourse about seeking solutions and impact-based work.

“The thing that’s been the most exciting and motivating for me is to hear after the first panel how many questions the audience [asked related to a] solutions mindset — not just how do we do the research and what’s the best way to do the research, but how do we turn that research into impact,” Mandeville said. 

Mandeville said SPHERE’s goal for the event was to increase community engagement with its research and mission. She felt that was achieved with the entirety of Hillman Hall’s Clark-Fox Forum filled, and over 250 people from 15 different countries tuned in via livestream. Because disease ecology is such an intersectional field, she wants to get as much of the community involved as possible. 

Justine Craig-Meyer, a WashU Law School alum in attendance, echoed that it was important for students and faculty from across academic divisions to collaborate.

“I think it’s important that there are people here from engineering; there are people here from public health, from the law and medical campus. This is not a topic that can be addressed in a silo,” Craig-Meyer said. “Everybody has a role to play, and they don’t have to be perfect.”