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- Variants, Breakthroughs, and Boosters: Understanding Omicron and the Future of the COVID-19 Pandemic (Virtual)
Variants, Breakthroughs, and Boosters: Understanding Omicron and the Future of the COVID-19 Pandemic (Virtual)
6:00 PM - 7:00 PM Wednesday, February 2, 2022
Location:
Online
Cambridge
The Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 rose to prominence less than a month after it was first detected, causing COVID-19 cases to skyrocket and highlighting the importance of a vaccine booster dose. Dr. Gaurav Gaiha and Dr. Wilfredo Garcia Beltran of the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard will present information on how the immune system reacts to Omicron and other variants, why breakthrough infections occur, and how boosters can prevent severe infection symptoms. Additionally, Derrick Neal, Chief Public Health Officer of the Cambridge Public Health Department, will discuss the rise of COVID-19 cases in our community and how we can continue to protect ourselves and others.
A question-and-answer session will follow.
Panelists:
Derrick Neal, a health administrator with extensive experience in public health and municipal government, has been named the new chief public health officer for the City of Cambridge
Wilfredo F. Garcia-Beltran is a Puerto Rican physician-scientist that is starting his own research group at the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT, and Harvard to study the role of natural killer (NK) cells in combating cancer and viral infections.
Dr. Gaiha received his D.Phil in Biochemistry from Oxford University as a Clarendon Scholar and his MD magna cum laude from the Health Sciences and Technology (HST) program at Harvard Medical School and MIT.
Register for this event