SER President’s Message

Spring is in the air, and at SER we are busy with the annual meeting and elections! I hope you are all managing things reasonably well through ongoing changes in the pandemic and public health guidance. I am experiencing some whiplash myself with the rapid recent changes, but taking lots of deep breaths and trying stay flexible.

I am so thrilled for our upcoming annual meeting in Chicago! I have missed connecting with all of you in person so much these past years. I would like to call your attention to our esteemed plenary speakers to give you a preview of some of the exciting presentations you can anticipate at the meeting.

Wednesday, June 15 Plenary

I invited Dr. Zeynep Tufekci because I thought we would benefit greatly from her perspectives on the Covid-19 pandemic – particularly how science, politics, and social media intersected in impacting the onset and course of the pandemic and how the US handled the pandemic. Dr. Tufekci’s experience engaging on this as a sociologist, drawing on her prior experience with SARS and Ebola, as well as her perspectives on assumptions that were made about human behavior (e.g., regarding masking), will be valuable and enlightening for our community to hear. I expect that her presentation will help us consider how epidemiologists can effectively engage with the journalists, social media, elected and other leaders to have an impact.

Thursday, June 16 Plenary

I invited Dr. Joseph L. Graves because I have observed ongoing confusion in epidemiology (and other fields) regarding the social construct of race, particularly when it comes to genetics. I thought we would benefit from a speaker who could provide critical perspectives on race, ancestry, genetics and disease. Dr. Graves takes an anti-racist perspective while also fully engaging with the latest developments in uses of and finding related to genomic data, specifically relevant to human disease. I anticipate that his talk will support epidemiologists’ journey to continue to engage with understanding human biological variation without falling into essentialist thinking regarding the social construct of race.

I would like to highlight a few additions to the annual meeting. We are trying out new oral abstract speed sessions that will take place on Wednesday, June 15, 5:30-6:00pm. This format offers more of our attendees the opportunity to give a talk, and complements the Oral Abstract Sessions (OAS) and Symposium session formats. Please come out and support folks at these sessions! You can also look forward to interesting talks in the OAS focused on topic areas added this year: Policing & Incarceration, and Study Design. Whatever you are looking forward to most at the conference, please remember to register by May 13, 2022 to take advantage of the early registration rates. If you are interested in our current plans regarding pandemic safety (to be updated if/when conditions change), please see here.

I would also like to highlight the SER election – voting is open now to May 13, 2022. Please take time to review the candidate statements and vote for folks who will take SER in the directions that sound promising to you. Wondering how to get involved and end up on the ballot yourself one day? Please indicate in your profile that you are interested in getting involved in a committee – our committees are described here.

Thanks to all of you for continuing to engaging with SER, despite variants, sub-variants, and whatever else is next on the winding pandemic road.