Newswise — The Society of Risk Analysis (SRA) has launched COVID Conversations on Risk, a series of podcast and webinars featuring various aspects of risk analysis.  The series is hosted by SRA President, Seth Guikema, Ph.D., University of Michigan.

The first episode features Pia-Johanna Schweizer, Ph.D., IASS Potsdam and Gilberto Monitbeller, Ph.D., Loughborough University and CREATE.  A recording of the webinar can be found on the SRA website at https://sra.org/covid-19-resources  

Schweizer address Systemic Risks of Pandemics -- Systemic risks threaten society’s essential systems and cause cascading events which lead to major disturbances or even complete system failure. The SARS-CoV-2 outbreak and resulting crisis demonstrate the systemic risks of pandemics. In this talk I will look at the current situation from the perspective of systemic risks and will investigate governance challenges.

Monitbeller covers - Efficient Health Capability Building for Pandemics - Health systems need to be fully capable of dealing with the pandemic we are experiencing now: from medical equipment to number of beds, from education campaigns to testing facilities. Critical capabilities must be identified and assessed. Resources must be efficiently used to build up the most valuable and critical health capabilities. And tough trade-offs might be needed to prioritize these capabilities. In this talk I will describe how portfolio decision analysis can be used to support this decision and help our nations in coping with this immense health threat.