17³Ô¹Ï

Monday, April 19, 2021, 4 - 5pm

with Dr. Sara Cooper, Biology Instructor, 17³Ô¹Ï

COVID-19 has changed the world we live in.  Vaccines will help us change it back.  Join us as we explore how a tiny virus wreaks such havoc and the biology behind the vaccines that can protect us from it.  Ample time will be provided to address your questions and concerns about COVID-19 and the vaccines. 

Sara Cooper has been a microbiology instructor at 17³Ô¹Ï since 2014.  She earned her Ph.D. in Cellular and Molecular Biology from Stanford University and did her undergraduate studies in Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder.   

Link for PDF of Presentation Slides

Monday, April 26, 2021, 4 - 5pm

with Dr. Rebecca Ryan, Health Instructor, 17³Ô¹Ï

The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed both public health and medicine to take quick and drastic measures to ensure that human lives are protected. In doing so, efforts to ensure vaccine safety and efficacy may seem startling to those to hear about pauses in vaccines. Join us as we discuss the latest in the Johnson & Johnson/Janssen vaccine pause and how vaccine hesitancy can be overcome by looking at historical and social justice issues that affect vaccine uptake.

Rebecca Ryan has been in public health and education since 2006. She earned her Ph.D. in Health Behavior and Human Sexuality from Indiana University, MPH from San Jose State University, and a BA from California State University, Sacramento. 

Link for PDF of Presentation Slides

Monday, May 3, 2021, 4 - 5pm

with Dr. Peter Hotez, Baylor College of Medicine

Peter J. Hotez, M.D., Ph.D. is Dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine and Professor of Pediatrics and Molecular Virology & Microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine where he is also the Co-director of the Texas Children’s Center for Vaccine Development (CVD) and Texas Children’s Hospital Endowed Chair of Tropical Pediatrics.  He is also University Professor at Baylor University, Fellow in Disease and Poverty at the James A Baker III Institute for Public Policy,  Senior Fellow at the Scowcroft Institute of International Affairs at Texas A&M University, Faculty Fellow with the Hagler Institute for Advanced Studies at Texas A&M University, and Health Policy Scholar in the Baylor Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy.

Dr. Hotez has authored more than 500 original papers and is the author of four single-author books, including Forgotten People, Forgotten Diseases (ASM Press); Blue Marble Health: An Innovative Plan to Fight Diseases of the Poor amid Wealth (Johns Hopkins University Press); Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel’s Autism (Johns Hopkins University Press); and a forthcoming 2020 book on vaccine diplomacy in an age of war, political collapse, climate change and antiscience (Johns Hopkins University Press).

Monday, May 10, 2021, 4 - 5pm

with Dr. Elsa Villarino, Assistant Public Health Officer, Santa Clara County Department of Public Health

Dr. Elsa Villarino is the County of Santa Clara Public Health Department’s Tuberculosis Controller and is an Assistant Health Officer for the Department. She serves in the Infectious Disease & Response Branch, leading efforts to investigate tuberculosis cases and outbreaks, to stop their spread, and to prevent disease spread in the community. Dr. Villarino also serves as Director of the Special Investigations Branch for COVID-19 Response, facilitating the development of Infection Prevention and Control for COVID-19 in healthcare facilities (HCFs). As Director, she oversees implementation of measures in HCFs to prevent the spread of COVID-19, including working with the stakeholders at these hospitals and long-term care facilities to support infection control. Prior to joining the County, she was a Medical Epidemiologist with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the Division of Tuberculosis Elimination where she was the lead of the TB Clinical Trials Consortium (TBTC). While at CDC, Dr. Villarino also worked in the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID) Division of Global Migration and Quarantine (DGMQ), as the Country Office Director for Mexico, and the Liaison for Ministry of Health in Mexico from 2013 to 2019. Dr. Villarino earned her MD at Autonomous University of Baja California and received a Master of Public Health from the San Diego State University Graduate School of Public Health. She is a member of the American Board of Preventive Medicine.