Elaine Nsoesie Shares Her Insights on Social Distancing

Recently former Hariri Institute for Computing research fellow, Dr. Elaine Nsoesie, was quoted in an article published by The Hill titled “Social Distancing Works, But Resistance Prompts Worries of Growing Crisis.” 

The article features the opinions of health officials and infectious disease experts on the implications of social distancing as a measure to control COVID-19. It also talks about the impact of the virus on different states based on how stringently the population follows the social distancing rules laid down by the local governments around the country.

Dr. Nsoesie, who is an Assistant Professor of Global Health at the College of Arts & Sciences, applies data science methodologies to global health problems, using digital data and technology to improve health. In particular, in the realm of surveillance of chronic and infectious diseases, she shares her point of view on social distancing.

“Some people think social distancing working means no cases, and that is not true, the point “is to make the curve smaller over time so doctors and nurses can take care of patients.”  – Elaine Nsoesie

Dr. Elaine Nsoesie completed her Ph.D. in Computational Epidemiology from the Genetics, Bioinformatics, and Computational Biology program at Virginia Tech, and her Ph.D. dissertation, Sensitivity Analysis and Forecasting in Network Epidemiology Models, at the Network Dynamics and Simulations Science Lab at Virginia Tech BioComplexity Institute. After postdoctoral associate positions at Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s Hospital, Dr. Nsoesie joined the faculty of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington.