Supercourse Update - January 2000
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Friends,
We were very pleased with the response to the last newsletter.
Benjamin analyzed the information concerning the faculty. There are a
total of 1,189 faculty members from 104 countries. It is of interest
that if the people with whom we do not have valid e-mails are in-
cluded, we would have close to 1,400 faculty. Participation by region
shows that 29% are from North America, 23% from Central and South
America, and 18 from West Europe. The rest of them represents 30%.
In the last four months of 1999, a total of 280 new electronic mes-
sages were received from people interested in participating in the
Supercourse (mean = 70 per month). If it continues at this rate, then
there will be over 2000 faculty by the end of the year. We will have
by far the largest group in the world interested in public health and
the Internet.
It is important to say that the participation of Central and South
America increased dramatically in this period, where participants of
Cuba had the highest response. The leading number of faculty are from
the US with 306, followed by Cuba with 65, UK with 57, Brazil with
52, Canada with 48, Argentina with 41, Australia with 38 Columbia
with 34, Peru with 33, South Africa with 33, and Japan, 31. There has
been enormous rise in interest in Latin America. In seeing this, plus
us being able to bring the Supercourse into all of the medical
schools of Latin America, we see the need for translation. We have
the possibility of being able to translate the course into Spanish
and Portuguese in the next few months.
Lectures, it must be everyone's New Years resolution to write lec-
tures. Last week we received 5, what a wonderful gift to us and the
students of the world for the new century. Part of this is we have
been re-contacting many of you who have promised to provide a lecture
to obtain a firm date as to when it would be received. Also, we are
using the Internet now to recruit faculty by sending an e-mail to any
one who publishes a good, interesting and exciting epidemiological
paper in the Lancet, Nature, Science and BMJ, all of which publishes
the e-mail address of the author. Sadly NEJM and the American Journal
of Epidemiology rarely present email addresses. The success rate, is
amazingly high: between 30-50% of the authors agree to provide a lec-
ture. We need some help with this journal watch, and if you are in-
terested in sending a short note to authors from other journals that
you find, this would be very beneficial. Just tell us what journals
you would like to review, and we will send to you what we have been
distributing.
It has been interesting in that one main reason why people do not
submit a lecture is the time that is needed to bring this into proper
English. Deb and I would be please to review rough drafts of the lec-
tures to help to bring them into Pittsburgh English (Deb) or Buffalo,
NY English (Ron) (neither of which most certainly are not the "Queens
English"). However, having native speakers to review these for you
will cut down considerably on the time. As we indicated on the last
note, we are very pleased with the publication rate, and want to
maintain this into the next century. The more we write, the more
likely the Supercourse will be maintained. We therefore would be
pleased to help you.
NEW LECTURES
(1) Attributable Fraction: Fundamental Differences in Interpretations
of Probability of the Causation by Ettinger AS and Payner RA Har-
vard School of Public Health
http://www.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec0861/index.htm
(2) Cryptosporidium: The Milwaukee Case by Criado A Universidad de
Alcala de Henares
http://www.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec0881/index.htm
(3) The Threat of NBC Terrorism by Piposzar JD Allegheny County
Health Department
http://www.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec0871/index.htm
Five more new lectures and two revised lectures will be open very
soon.
PRESENTATION OF THE SUPERCOURSE IN JAPAN
The 10th annual meeting of Japan Epidemiological Association will be
held in Yonaga, Japan, during January 27 and 28, 2000. At the meet-
ing, Dr. Suyama, Chairman of Department of Epidemiology, Nagasaki Ra-
diation Effects Research Foundation will do the demonstration of the
Supercourse. He has been collaborating with Hiko with WHO for the Su-
percourse, Health, Environment, and Sustainable Development and
translating it into Japanese as well. They set up four computers
hooked to the Internet with an ISDN at the meeting. Dr. Satoh with
Global Programe on Evidence for Health Policy, WHO will be present at
the demonstration as well to support Dr. Suyama's activity. You can
locate the web page describing the activity in Japanese at:
http://www.pitt.edu/~super1/JEA/
You can view the photos of the demonstration of the Supercourse at
the Japan Epidemiological Association at:
http://cancer.med.tottori-u.ac.jp/~jea/sp1.gif
http://cancer.med.tottori-u.ac.jp/~jea/sp2.gif
http://cancer.med.tottori-u.ac.jp/~jea/sp3.gif
Finally, we would like to inform you of an upcoming meeting at Har-
vard University, The Internet and the Public's Health: Impact on In-
dividuals, Communities and the World. For details, visit the confer-
ence web site at:
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/health-internetconference
Best wishes from Pittsburgh,
Ron, Deb, Akira, Benamin, Eun, Beatriz
mailto:ghnetu+@pitt.edu
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