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Southern Illinois University Edwardsville
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AHMAD LATHAN reporter
The political science department will research terrorism and political violence in southern Illinois thanks to a grant from Homeland Security. Suranjan Weeraratne, associate professor of political science, said the U.S. Department of Homeland Security put out a notice back in April when he noticed that the university should apply for it. “I and the other two colleagues got together, we submitted an application in May, and they let us know about a month ago that we got it,” Weeraratne said. He said the department was happy to receive the grant for $332,491 and how competitive the process was. “Joe Biden talked about the DHS awarding universities, local police departments, and corporations so the university will benefit from visibility,” Weeraratne said.
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Thursday, October 20, 2022 Vol. 76 No. 8
He said through their research they will talk to a multitude of groups in the area. “We intend to talk with a bunch of people, law enforcement, community organizations, faith leads, college students and so on,” Weeraratne said. Weeraratne said the program does not focus on any political spectrum. “I don’t think the right or the left has a full monopoly on violence,” Weerarante said. “So whether you are on the right or the left you can have violent elements with your group.” Weeraratne said their project guarantees for a two-year period from October until Sept. 30, 2024. “The first part of the grant is we are going to do a survey of people in southern Illinois and the second part is based on the data that we get from the survey where we do training sets,” Weeraratne said. Weeraratne said undergraduate research assistants are going to be involved in each stage of the project and
they intend to hire a few from next semester onward. “Our major expectation is increasing societal awareness so that is why we are doing training sessions for law enforcement,” Weeraratne said. He said his work dealing with terrorism internationally will connect well with this program’s targets. “A lot of my work has been on international terrorism,” Weeraratne said. “So those are the same kinds of strategies that some of the white supremacists are using right now.” Political science chair Ken Moffett said the university will receive benefits from the program work being conducted in the southern Illinois community. “There will be workshops that are going to be developed for the community with respect to terrorism and political violence prevention,” Moffett said. “Some of those materials are going to be used in a couple of political science courses.” Moffett said the southern Illinois region
has predictors for political violence, which is why the area is fitting for the program. “In the 41 counties that we’re going to be examining it because a lot of the predictors for domestic terrorism and political violence exist right in this area,” Moffett said. “Part of the grant is to help mitigate some of those conditions.” Moffett said his expertise in politics will help within the survey part of the program. “I am one of the people who is helping design the survey and analyze the survey results once we get them, then also bringing my expertise to bear with respect to American politics,” Moffett said. Moffett said he’s excited to begin work. He said his expectations for this program are to enhance community awareness regarding political violence. “My expectation is enhanced levels of community awareness and law enforcement,” Moffett said. “The hope is that people will know what to do and possibly prevent an incident of domestic terrorism or political violence.”
Pharmacy faculty take on COVID and monkeypox misinformation DYLAN HEMBROUGH reporter
With persistent COVID cases and an outbreak of monkeypox, there is a lot of information. According to pharmacy faculty, may or may not be backed up by science. Chris Lynch has dealt with COVID vaccine myths for much of the last few years of his career. Lynch, professor of pharmacy practices and director of clinical programs at SIUE, said pharmacists have a special role to play in the health care system. “In our role as the most easily accessible health care professionals – and one of the most trusted – pharmacists are uniquely positioned to answer questions to the general public about vaccines,” Lynch said. Lynch said one of the most widespread misconceptions about COVID is that it is no longer a threat. “While COVID is not resulting in as many hospitalizations as it did last year, the frequency is still relatively high,” L y n c h said. “In particular, it’s still a big risk among the elderly and immunocompromised people with underlying diseases. I’m hesitant to say that we’re better. I think that globally, it’s true, but in specific populations it’s still a big issue.”
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Many of the School of Pharmacy faculty have jobs off-campus in clinical settings, where they can provide education and administer vaccines to the general public. Lynch said off-campus education helps both the public and the health care community. “Anything we can do to make more health care providers knowledgeable about a subject, and the general public more knowledgeable about a subject … It starts to break down those barriers to seeking information [and] care,” Lynch said. Miranda Wilhelm teaches a course in immunizations and has played a direct role in educating the wider health care community on vaccine updates. Wilhelm said she and a colleague from a Chicago pharmacy school collaborated on a series of videos and lectures dispelling myths about vaccines. “I did one on how the vaccines are made, and how they’re safe and effective,” Wilhelm said. Like Wilhelm, Jared Sheley said he has also educated both patients and health care professionals on the newest i n for mation and updates. Sheley, a professor in the School of Pharmacy, also does rounds in a hospital with a multidisciplinary team. “We had a big role,” Sheley said. “Not just managing these patients day-to-day …
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But we also did several formal lectures and presentations to our medical staff, to our physicians, to inform them of latest evidence: ‘Here’s how we think we can apply it and maybe should not apply certain things.’” Over the last few years, Sheley said he has seen a lot of COVID patients. In his position as a health care provider to sick patients in the hospital, Sheley said he often had to dispel common myths about the virus and treatment options. “With COVID, everything was brandnew, so initially when we had access to these drugs none of them were F D A - a p proved for treatment,” Sheley said. “Before we could treat anybody, part of the process was that we had to go through a specialized informed consent process … That in itself can be a deterrent.” Wilhelm said much of her recent work has revolved around informing people about the monkeypox vaccine, which goes under the trade name Jynneos. Jynneos is not a new vaccine, but supply is severely limited because this is the first time monkeypox has become this widespread. Due to undersupply and a shortage of professionals, the federal government has authorized pharmacy technicians and students to administer these vaccines. “It’s part of the PREP Act related to monkeypox,” Wilhelm said. “Some of the PREP Act is what gave pharmacists and students and technicians the right to administer flu and COVID vaccines throughout the pandemic.” Lynch said he is always sure to draw a distinction between misinformation and
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common myths. Lynch said that with misinformation, there is more agency in the spreading of falsehoods than there is with myths. “When politicians on both sides of the political spectrum were getting involved in very specific recommendations about drug therapy, that was really troubling because those re com mend at ion s may or may not have been based on any valid scientific literature,” Lynch said. Lynch said he became a pharmacist around the time AIDS appeared on the world stage, and that he sees parallels between media treatment of AIDS back then and monkeypox today. “When people who suffer from a disease begin to be marginalized because of their gender identity or sexuality … Then a segment of the rest of the public loses empathy for those people,” Lynch said. “That’s a real problem too, and it leads to people who maybe should seek care earlier being reluctant to seek care. It leads to people not wanting to be vaccinated because they feel that the vaccine itself will label them in some way that they’re not comfortable with.” Lynch said the effects of misinformation are often more far-reaching than the individual. “Any time you try to marginalize people who are suffering from a disease,” Lynch said, “all it does is reduce the ability of the entire public health system to respond to a problem.” For more information on monkeypox, visit the CDC’s website.
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