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Sylvie Briand

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Sylvie Briand

Director, Global Infectious Hazards Preparedness, World Health Organization (WHO)
Sylvie Briand

Dr. Sylvie Briand, MD, Ph.D., MPH is Director of the Global Infectious Hazard Preparedness department (GIH) at the World Health Organization’s (WHO) headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. GIH develops global strategies to prevent and control epidemic-prone diseases under the International Health Regulations. The scope of GIH includes COVID-19 but also other dangerous pathogens such as pandemic influenza, plague, Nipah virus, smallpox, and other pox viruses and arboviruses (Zika, yellow fever, and Chikungunya) as well as Disease X. Dr. Briand has been at the forefront of managing acute infectious risks to global health for more than 20 years, ensuring the development of global mechanisms and sustainable frameworks to facilitate multi sectoral and multi-partners coordination for epidemics and pandemics. It includes: • The “Eliminating Yellow fever Epidemics” Strategy (EYE) with more than 50 partners to protect 1.4 billion people against yellow fever by 2026, • The implementation of the Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Framework, a bold and innovative public-private partnership to improve pandemic preparedness • The development of OPEN WHO a Massive On Line Open Course platform to train millions of people during pandemic • And more recently the management of the infodemic due to the COVID 19 crisis in partnerships with other UN agencies and social media platforms. WHO has promoted the development of the Infodemiology, a new scientific discipline to support “infodemic management.”