Measures to contain the spread of COVID-19 have impacted all areas of society, including research. Collaborating in shared lab space and conducting face-to-face interviews are among activities suspended or curtailed at Canadian universities. Added to that is pressure on many researchers to switch rapidly to an online teaching format.<\/p>\n
Although conducting most research under current circumstances is difficult or even impossible, there are cases where long-running research can continue, albeit in a modified format. Three Brock University researchers share how they’re managing to continue their research in a COVID-19 world.<\/p>\n
Professor of Health Sciences Ana Sanchez conducts field and laboratory research on neglected parasitic diseases such as soil-transmitted helminths and tapeworm parasites of humans and pigs in Honduras. She also researches capacity building and increasing research proficiencies in developing countries, leading her to work with national and international organizations to develop research systems.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Parasite expert Ana Sanchez\u2019s mid-February vacation to Chile ended with the initial appearance of COVID-19 in South America. As Sanchez was flying home, her PhD student in Honduras was able to carry out a round of testing on children in a remote village to see if a combination of two different de-worming drugs would be an effective treatment for children with parasites.<\/p>\n But right afterward, the country went into lockdown. To complete the study, the student would have had to return to the same village several weeks later to take another sample, which became impossible to do.<\/p>\n Luckily, the study was in its advanced stages, having fully tested some 120 children in one village. The team needed an extra 52 children from the village where the student had gone.<\/p>\n But all is not lost, says Sanchez, noting that, although the study won\u2019t be a complete clinical trial because the sample size is incomplete, \u201cwe can recover some of the data and maybe tweak some objectives and still do something with the samples and the data we gathered.\u201d<\/p>\n Specifically, Sanchez and her team will be isolating DNA from the parasite samples collected so far to predict whether or not the drug combination would be an effective treatment.<\/p>\n The method is not perfect, she says, but \u201cwe can say with some degree of certainty that the treatment may have worked. I think that could be enough to make recommendations or predictions that this may be the way to go.\u201d<\/p>\n Associate Professor of Psychology Angela Evans is Director of Brock\u2019s Social-Cognitive Development Lab. She and her team study how to talk to children and obtain the most honest and accurate reports about their experiences. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Psychologist Angela Evans is working with Lindsay Malloy of Ontario Tech University and Johnathan Comer of Florida International University on a\u00a0study on children\u2019s reactions to the COVID-19 pandemic<\/a>. While the team would prefer to interview families in person, the pandemic has shifted their methodology to an online survey, says Evans.<\/p>\n Evans had been working on another research project with Malloy when COVID-19 hit.<\/p>\n \u201cBoth of us were saying, \u2018The impact this is going to have on parents and families is overwhelming and fascinating,” says Evans. “It is something we have never experienced before with new challenges and complications.\u00a0We are both parents ourselves and we\u2019re feeling the impact on our own families and so we thought, \u2018What can we do to understand what\u2019s going on and help families through this?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n To firm up ideas and plans, what followed was \u201cconstant communication\u201d of e-mails, text messages and video calls \u2014 \u201cmore than I\u2019ve ever experienced in such a short time\u201d \u2014 among Evans, Malloy and their collaborator Comer, who has previously published numerous studies on children\u2019s reactions to the Boston Marathon bombing.<\/p>\n