World’s leading trauma experts hold virtual event for health-care providers on preparing for coming tsunami of pandemic-related mental health challenges

TORONTO, June 2, 2022 — Media are invited to attend a virtual gathering of leading trauma experts from around the globe who will discuss the pandemic’s devastating impact on mental health and what system changes are needed to prepare for the looming tsunami of mental health challenges.

Disaster Psychiatry Canada’s fifth annual Psychiatric Dimensions of Disaster event will examine issues such as grief arising from the COVID-19 deaths of more than six million people worldwide and cognitive issues such as brain fog associated with long-COVID.

The annual conference for health-care professionals around the world looks at how communities can pull together when disasters occur to address mental health.

When: 9 a.m.-noon, Friday, June 3, 2022. Media are invited to listen to the webinar. Interviews can also be arranged in advance or on Friday. View the full program.

Where: Register for the webinar. Contact media@oma.org to arrange an interview.

Speakers include:

• Dr. Frank Sommers, founding chair, Section of Disaster Psychiatry, Canadian Psychiatric Association and Disaster Psychiatry Canada, University of Toronto
• Dr. Robert Ursano, psychiatry and neuroscience director at the Centre for the Study of Traumatic Stress and editor of the Textbook of Disaster Psychiatry
• Dr. Frederick Stoddard, professor of psychiatry at the Harvard Medical School
• Dr. John Wong Chee Meng, a professor of mental health and neuroscience at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine at the National University of Singapore
• Dr. Kenneth Fung, director of global mental health and associate professor, Department of Psychiatry, University of Toronto
• Dr. Ran Balicer, professor of public health, Ben-Gurion University and chair of Israel’s National Expert Advisory Team on COVID-19 Response