RHU First Aid Club president, Malek Wehbi, and RHU medical microbiologist Professor Mahmoud Halablab, who both serve on the university’s Corona Virus Safety Committee (RHU CSC), gave an engaging and extensive discussion on the “Current Advances into COVID-19 Vaccines” during a webinar on January 27, 2021, at 7:00 p.m. It helped educate the participants about the COVID-19 vaccines and distinguish the wrong information often shared on social media platforms.
The webinar delved into several topics on current vaccines, the technology behind them, and techniques employed to develop them. It also discussed the logistics behind a historical massive vaccination campaign, what it takes to establish herd immunity using these vaccines, duration needed to control the disease, financing production, and post-vaccination challenges. After the discussion, Dr. Halablab answered questions from the participants. The webinar was fruitful, informative, and successful.
A year ago, a new zoonotic virus SARS-COV2 swept the globe, the race for an effective, safe and efficacious vaccine was immediately the top priority to protect us from being infected by the SARS CoV2 virus and getting sick with COVID-19.
In addition to more than 2 million views for his more than 200 TV interviews on COVID-19, Dr. Mahmoud Halablab has completed his Ph.D. in Microbiology at King's College London, the University of London in 1991, specializing in clinical and medical microbiology.
Dr. Halablab was appointed a university professor at King’s College and spent more than 15 years as an academic before joining Rafik Hariri University in 2009 as a full-time university professor in the College of Arts and Sciences.
He published more than 50 peer-reviewed research papers, a textbook entitled “Infection and Immunity”, and textbook chapters. Some of his research articles have been published in highly prestigious academic journals, including The Lancet, one of the world's top medical journal and another article in Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal published by CDC. He named three new bacteria that have formally been accepted by the International Committee on Systematics of Prokaryotes.
He is also a regular referee for research articles published in the Society for Applied Microbiology and other scientific journals. On several occasions, he was a keynote speaker on water and food-related issues. He is also a regular speaker at several national and international conferences on Legionella infections and foodborne diseases.