A panel discussion and question-and-answer session on the Ebola crises and the risk it poses will take place 4-5:30 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 4, at the Forsyth Building at Western Carolina University. 

Four WCU faculty members, including an environmental health professor who has spent more than 20 years studying the spread and control of disease like Ebola, will be on the panel. 

Burton Ogle, director of WCU’s environmental health program, will discuss the risk of exposure and transmission of Ebola and prevention strategies. Ogle has been researching the virus since he was consulted 25 years ago when a strain of Ebola was detected in monkeys in Virginia.

Jen Schiff, assistant professor of political science and public affairs, will talk about humanitarian efforts to stop the disease’s spread and discuss why shutting down the borders won’t necessarily solve the problem. Rebecca Dobbs, geography instructor, will talk about spatial patterns of the Ebola outbreak and the role of environmental changes in affecting that. Saheed Aderinto, assistant professor of history and Nigeria native, will talk about Ebola in the context of Africa’s underdevelopment, something he traces to the trans-Atlantic slave trade. 

Free. For more information contact Niall Michelsen, 828.227.3336.