Friday March 25, 2022
12:30-1:30 p.m.
Online Zoom Meeting
NOTE: Please See Announcements of a Special Ukraine War Event and a Department of Political Science Event at the Bottom of this Newsletter
Dear Colleagues:
Spring is beginning to, well, spring; but aside from that, prospects in the world still leave a lot to be desired. As inflation and Ukraine claim the headlines, the past, present and future of the Covid-19 pandemic still demand and deserve attention. Nearly a million Americans have died of Covid-19, and only in a weird way could the weekend’s rate of a thousand deaths a day seem like relief. Many citizens are burnt out, and exhaustion may be even more severe among health care professionals. Both the federal government and nearly all states have loosened social distancing restrictions, and while vaccination rates are rising, progress has been slow. It seems like whenever a burst of infection from a new variant retreats, a newer version emerges. Vaccines and better treatments have made infection less deadly, but still not enough to return life to normal – as is shown by the fact that the “Friday Lunch” remains online.
So where are we in the pandemic? Are we nearing the point where Covid-19 would become, or should be treated as, a recurring disease like flu, a concern but not normally a crisis? What should we make of the surges and declines in infection levels across the world – such that the virus is now making a comeback in countries that seemed to have controlled it in early 2020? What do we know that we didn’t know in 2020 – and what do we still need to learn? Join us as Professor Mark Cameron, who briefed us in October of 2020, returns with an update.
Signing In
The “Friday Lunch” has been convening each Friday that classes are in session during Fall and “Spring” semesters since 1989. Regrettably, after more than three decades meeting in person and eating lunch (or at least coffee and cookies) together, we had to take our gatherings online after the pandemic hit in 2020. I am hoping we can do some sort of dual-delivery, in-person and online combination, before this semester ends.
But not yet. For now we will still meet by Zoom. Our discussions begin at 12:30 p.m., the usual time. Even when we resume in-person meetings, we will set it up so people can participate by Zoom. Each week we will send out this newsletter with information about the topic. It will also include a link to register (for free) for the discussion. If you do not get the newsletter, you should also be able to get the information each Monday by checking http://fridaylunch.case.edu/. When you register, you will automatically receive from the Zoom system the link to join the meeting. Please note that we will open the meeting at Noon so people aren’t all signing on at once, but the speaker starts at 12:30.
This week’s link for registration is:
https://cwru.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJMtceurqjMpHdIVSIV2Qh4C–JMZnpVvUus
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
Please e-mail padg@case.edu if you have questions about how the Zoom version of the Friday Lunch will work or any other suggestions. Or call at 216 368-2426 and we’ll try to get back to you. We are very pleased to be partnering this semester with the Siegal Lifelong Learning Program to share information about the discussions.
Best wishes for safety and security for you and yours,
Joe White
Luxenberg Family Professor of Public Policy and Director, Center for Policy Studies
About Our Guest
Dr. Mark Cameron applies genomic technologies and bioinformatic methods to identify biomarkers (immune correlates) of infectious diseases, such as HIV, and chronic inflammatory conditions, such as psoriasis. He and his team have broad computational expertise in analyzing across data types and studies, and focus their work on targets or diagnostics that can be used in specific immunotherapy or vaccine design.
Dr. Cameron also directs the genomics activities of several large cores or consortia, including the Case Western Reserve University Applied Functional Genomics Core, the Miami Center for AIDS Research (Inter-CFAR) Bioinformatics Core, the Case Western Reserve University CFAR Systems Biology Core, and the international Early Treated Perinatally Infected individuals: Improving Children’s Lives with an HIV Vaccine (EPIICAL). These collaborative cores allow Dr. Cameron to apply his systems approach and data from gene sequence, to gene transcription, to protein, cellular and antibody function, to find out what goes right or wrong in the immune systems of patients who respond variably to various diseases or treatments.
Schedule of Friday Lunch Upcoming Topics and Speakers:
April 1: The French Presidential Election. Wtih Patrick Chamorel, Ph.D., Senior Resident Scholar and Lecturer, Stanford in Washington, Stanford University.
April 8: Greening the Grid: The Energy Storage Challenge. With Robert F. Savinell, Ph.D, Distinguished University Professor and George S. Dively Professor of Chemical Engineering.
April 15: TBA
April 22: The Present and Future of Cryptocurrency. With Peter Zimmerman, Ph.D., Research Economist, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
Russia’s War in Ukraine After One Month
Thursday, March 24th, 7:00 – 8:30 p.m. Doors open 6:45 p.m.
Tinkham Veale University Center, Ballroom A
David Clingingsmith, Associate Professor of Economics
Kelly McMann, Professor of Political Science
Ken Ledford, Associate Professor of History
Roman Sheremeta, Associate Professor of Economics
An expert panel of CWRU faculty will present an analysis of Russia’s War in Ukraine one month after the invasion.
Prof. Kelly McMann will open with an assessment of domestic and international pressures to end the war in Ukraine.
Prof. Clingingsmith will provide an economic perspective on the sanctions against Russia and the war more broadly.
Prof. Sheremeta will discuss resistance in Ukraine, drawing on both his scholarly work and experience as a Ukrainian citizen and academic leader in Ukraine.
Prof. Ledford will ground the current conflict in the history of guerilla resistance in the Ukraine’s 1917-22 war of independence and during the Second World War, when the country was occupied by the Germans and then liberated by the Red Army.
Sponsored by the Departments of Economics, History, and Political Science and the Center for Policy Studies.
Working with Human Communities to Protect Gorilla Communities: A discussion with Sarah Tolbert (CWRU BA ’09; Yale M.A.s in Environmental Management and Global Affairs, 2016)
Monday, March 28th, 5:00 – 6:30 p.m.
Tinkham Veale University Center, Senior Classroom B
Mountain Gorillas are the only Great Ape species whose population is currently increasing. National governments, conservation partners, and tourism have been instrumental to this conservation success in Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, and Uganda. The population of the Grauer’s gorilla found only in eastern DRC, however, has decreased by 77% in the last decade. This talk will address the difference and what conservation organizations and national governments are doing to provide additional protections to the Grauer’s gorilla. We will particularly focus on the role that local communities, who live near gorilla habitat, play in forest and wildlife conservation in DRC and Rwanda. At a time when stories about extinction and climate change dominate environmental news, this talk highlights the hope that lies in working with communities to achieve seemingly impossible environmental goals.
Sarah Tolbert is an interdisciplinary forest conservation expert with over a decade of experience working in sub-Saharan Africa, starting with the Peace Corps in Benin and most recently with the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International in Musanze, Rwanda. She is currently continuing research while working on her Ph.D. in Geography at University of Wisconsin, Madison, with an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. |
