NTDs: the Most Important Diseases You’ve Never Heard Of

Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) infect over 1.4 billion people worldwide – disabling and disfiguring adults, stunting the physical and cognitive development of children, and limiting the economic productivity and development of families and communities. But there is good news about NTDs: for the extremely low cost of 50 cents per person, per year, we can treat and protect someone from all seven of these diseases – with the goal of controlling and eliminating them for good. Learn about the part you can play in this momentous global effort to end not just one, but seven diseases, in the next decade from Emily Conron, student outreach coordinator for the Sabin Vaccine Institute’s END7 campaign.

Speaker: Emily Conron

Student Outreach Coordinator, END7 Campaign

Resource Development Officer, Sabin Vaccine Institute

Monday, September 12 at 1:00 pm

Biological Sciences Building, Room 404E

Emily Conron coordinates student outreach for END7, a campaign of the Sabin Vaccine Institute. She got involved in the movement to control and eliminate NTDs after learning about them in a biology class as a freshman at the University of Notre Dame, co-founding the first NTD-focused student advocacy and fundraising group, ND Fighting NTDs, in 2009. After seeing the effects of NTDs firsthand while interviewing lymphatic filariasis patients in Haiti for a psychology research project, Emily joined the END7 team to help create an international movement of students advocating for this neglected global health issue. She has since presented at more than seventy universities and conferences to recruit student supporters, created the END7 Student Advisory Board and Campus Leaders Council to strengthen student leadership, coordinated student fundraising efforts that have net more than $100,000 for NTD treatment and prevention programs, and supported thousands of student advocacy actions, including meetings with more than 70 congressional offices on the annual END7 Student Advocacy Day. Emily also coordinates Sabin’s faith-based outreach and supports the policy and communications teams with strategic projects.

Sponsored by the UGA Center for Tropical and Emerging Global Diseases