Tuesday 16 May | 16:15-17:15

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Thea Kølsen Fischer a Danish Professor and Virus Detective, was a member of the international expert team sent by WHO to the COVID-19 pandemic epicentre Wuhan in 2021. In this keynote she will provide an insight into the work on the pandemic origin tracing as a scientist and virus detective working in the grey zone of science and politics, where the edges are sharp and the balance delicate, and where “every step you take, someone will be watching you”.

Thea K Fischer is trained as a medical doctor and public health expert in Denmark and as a professional leader and virus detective in United States, with the world as her workplace for many years. When she was selected as one of 10 international experts in 2020 to work on the team with the goal to trace the pandemic origin, she had no hesitations as this seemed as the most meaningful way to use her competencies in the midst of the pandemic. A task, which brought her to the center of the world’s attention for the 10 weeks the team worked in Wuhan and the following weeks before publishing the final report of the so-called “Phase 1 work”. She is a member of the recently established WHO Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens advising the WHO Secretariate on technical and scientific considerations regarding emerging and re-emerging pathogens, and an author of the critically acclaimed book “Virusdetektiven”. Listen to her story as it unfolds in Wuhan talking to the first COVID-19 victims, visiting the worlds most talked about virus laboratory and the dark corners of the closed Huanan Wet Market, where it all might have started. How the political interests have challenged the scientific work and how you as a scientist and public leader can be challenged when politics and science is mixed.

Thea Kolsen Fischer, University of Copenhagen, Denmark