Peaks and Valleys

I often tell my graduate students and post-docs that science is a series of peaks and valleys. Some days you eat the bear; some days the bear eats you. You know what I mean. Wednesday afternoon I received an email from Pfizer. Back in July I had applied to them through their Investigator Initiated Research (IIR) program to request antibiotics to treat the subjects who test positive in our sexually transmitted infections (STI) surveillance project. The email was bad news. Pfizer turned down my request. I told myself that this was not a show-stopper. We can still do the study and treat the patients, it will just cost us more to do it. Since the beginning, I have been looking for ways to find money and save money for the project. So it was a setback, a big disappointment. Everything seemed to be falling into place up to now. I left the lab to take a walk over to the old university section of Christianville. Here is where a new guesthouse is going up next to the remains of the building that collapsed in the 2010 earthquake. I leaned on the fence and looked out over the countryside towards the mountains to the south. This country really is like the Haitian proverb, “Dye mon, gen mon.”  Beyond the mountains, more mountains. Bill and Donna walked up the path and stopped to chat. I told them about the Pfizer email. They encouraged me not to give up. There would be another way to do it. They are right. The project will still get done, somehow. I felt better.

Looking south from Christianville Missions, Gressier

A few hours later after dinner, I returned to the lab. I woke up my laptop. There was another email from Pfizer. Since my IIR proposal had been turned down they suggested that I submit the request for antibiotics via the Corporate Affairs Department where it would be considered as a donation and not a research protocol. Suddenly the future looked bright again. I quickly replied, thanked them and asked for details on how to proceed through Corporate Affairs. By early Thursday morning, I had connected with Pfizer Corporate Affairs in Costa Rica and received instructions on how to submit my request. I’m moving forward. Hopefully this time, we will be able to get the medications.

This afternoon I received an email announcing that the proposal I had submitted to AFHSC-GEIS (Armed Forces Health Surveillance Center-Global Emerging Infections Surveillance and Response System) for the STI surveillance project is going to be funded! This is really exciting news. I had been waiting and hoping for this funding since the spring. Now I can do what I came down here to do. And now that I have the money, we can seriously start plans for the forward lab in Baradères. I have already christened the lab with a new name. I call the Baradères lab UF-EPI Haiti Lab 2-Baradères. The existing lab in Gressier will be UF-EPI Haiti Lab 1-Gressier. I already started using the names in my emails to all the UF people. If it catches on, fine. If they don’t like it, maybe they can come up with a better name. I just thought was time to give the Baradères lab some credibility and get it in people's minds as a real, soon-to-happen entity. Because it will happen now.

 

“Bonjou, Baradères, Mwen ap vini.” 

“Baradères, here I come.”

Mountains near Baradères