Some of the FluModCont partners will be attend the Influenza A(H1N1)v modelling working group meeting organised by ECDC on 24-25 September in Stockolm. The objective of the two-day expert meeting will be to present on-going modelling work on European and global level. The meeting will give the possibility to get input from European countries on ongoing modelling activities and to get an overview not only of modelling activities on a global level but specifically of modelling of vaccination strategies and of non-pharmaceuical interventions. ECDC has gathered since the end of April all modelling groups in Europe working with pandemic influenza into an informal group that has met at regular intervals. International modelling experts will be partecipate to the meeting but also representatives from countries with no own modelling capacity are invited to provide input and suggestion.

Source: www.ecdc.europa.eu

An informal network of mathematical modellers, administered by the World Health Organization (WHO) through its Health Security and Environment cluster (WHO-HSE), has been established with several FluModCont researchers participating. The first meeting has been held in Geneve on 1-3 July. A first publication on the work of the MM network has been published in the Weekly Epidemiological Record (WER), see http://www.who.int/entity/wer/2009/wer8434/en/index.html

Major aim of the MM network is to assist WHO in describing and assessing the pandemic influenza A(H1N1)v, and to provide analyses to guide decision-making for public health interventions and policy through the application of mathematical modelling methods to epidemiological and virological/genetic data.

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) is organizing a meeting of the Surveillance and Studies in a Pandemic Working Group at the ECDC offices on the 14-15 July 2009. This group of experts from all over the EU and EEA countries as well as experts from the US, Australia and Canada will be discussing the current plans and various activities to deal with the surveillance of influenza A(H1N1)v and to try to agree on common protocols for the studies and reporting mechanisms that would need to be in place before the expected autumn wave of the pandemic. A session of the meeting will be dedicated to present the modelling work on the pandemic influenza A(H1N1)v of some European groups collaborating with ECDC. Contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it for more information on this topic.

Source: http://ecdc.europa.eu/