The Dominican Association of Medical Faculties and Schools (ADOFEM) participated in the National Epidemiology Conference 2022 entitled ‘Lessons learned from Covid-19: Impact on the National Health System’, an activity organized by the Department of Public Health (MSP).
During the activity, held at the Hilton Hotel in Bayahibe, ADOFEM introduced its report entitled ‘Epidemiological adaptability with biosecurity measures in academic environment to the Covid-19 pandemic’, which was dictated by Dr. William Duke, M.D., Dean Epidemiologist of the Faculty of Health Sciences of the Universidad Nacional Pedro Henríquez Ureña (UNPHU) and past president of ADOFEM.
In his presentation, Duke explained the major changes that had to be implemented by different universities, academies, and institutions of higher education to have financial, human and technological resources to respond to an unprecedented scenario by the pandemic, which forced to move from presence to virtuality to train students.
He stated that the changes were generated from the MSP’s order to implement confinement due to the increase in positive cases of Covid-19 in the country, which resulted in the implementation of a series of biosecurity protocols, sending home more than 35,000 students belonging to the country’s 11 faculties and 15 medical schools.
In this regard, Duke highlighted the great effort and support of higher education institutions to contribute in compliance with the biosecurity measures implemented by the health authorities, moving in recent months to a return to normal from the decline of infections.
