Citation for the Griffiths Medal 2023
Paul R. Harper, Joshua W. Moore and Thomas E. Woolley
Covid-19 Transmission Modelling of Students Returning Home from University
The authors of this paper are to be commended for their excellent paper “Covid-19 Transmission Modelling of Students Returning Home from University” which exemplifies both the theory and practice of Health Systems research. The judges thought this paper was excellent in a number of important ways. Firstly, it represents the swift mobilisation of existing expertise to a new (and urgent) application during the COVID-19 pandemic, the practical extension of the data modelling used and the dissemination of this knowledge. Secondly, the paper conveys its technical content in a way that is accessible and informative to general readers with a background in Health Systems (both academic researchers and health/government leaders) meaning that key ideas can be shared beyond the context of Universities. Furthermore, at a time of great social need the researchers clearly worked at high speed to put their existing knowledge-base to the wider service of many for the public good. This is evidenced in the timing of the publication, the real-time engagement with Policy-Making in Wales and in the distribution of open source code and downloadable app that can be used to replicate their results and furthermore to estimate secondary infections in other contexts and locations.
The authors' analysis of likely secondary household infection rates as students returned home from University was shared with the Welsh Government and the Wales Higher Education Covid-19 Task and Finish Group groups and it helped to inform policy for the 2 week Oct-Nov firebreak in Wales in 2020 as well as supporting later policy developments aimed at trying to mitigate the effects of large scale student movements at the end of term (especially in the run up to Christmas). Their work has made a clear contribution to helping decision makers in Wales to understand and anticipate some of the likely effects of these movements on communities and their Health Services.
Health Systems, Volume 10 (1) 31-40
https://doi.org/10.1080/20476965.2020.1857214