Impact of Environmental Changes on Infectious Diseases

The IECID meeting just ended. The conference in Sitges, near Barcelona, had about 180 attendees, with 3 full days of talks and posters. It was an impressive group of scientists, all interested in understanding how climate change and other rapid global changes are affecting the transmission of diseases such as malaria, Dengue fever, schistosomiasis, West Nile virus, and Ebola. There were a lot of talks about how to model and predict what the future will hold for infectious diseases. I was impressed with some of the statistics: malaria is still killing nearly a million people each year. Influenza kills nearly the same number. People travel more than 5 trillion miles every year on airplanes (18 times to the sun and back), and now mobile phones can track huge populations of people throughout the world and help better model how diseases are spreading. There were fewer presentations on wildlife diseases, but people appreciated the work I do; studying deforestation and climate change and avian pathogens.

I got to experience a little of the Catalan culture here in Sitges. The Cau Ferrat museum had paintings of the local artist Santiago Rusiñol, who is revered in Sitges. His house, now a museum, is a mansion on the sea. But even more fun was the Catalan cuisine. My favorite was the Calçots amb Romesco – Grilled Spring Onions with Romesco Sauce. You put a bib on, and take the grilled onions, peel them and dip them in the tomato/pepper/nut/garlic sauce. It is messy but delicious. I was always envious of the people who eat lobster with their bibs: this is a way for vegans to have a comparable experience. Vegan paella is always great too.

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Eating Calçots amb Romesco

This is a beach town, but I haven’t seen the sun at all. I must come back in the summer sometime.

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