Prof. Howard Lee gave a talk at the 17th JSCPT-KSCPT Joint Symposium, Kobe, Japan, on December 15, 2023. In his presentation entitled 'Real-World Data Analysis as a Clinical Pharmacologist: Experience and Some Thoughts', Prof. Lee. introduce the audience to the RWD research works CCADD has performed for the past 3 or so years, all of which have been published in reputable journals or under review shown below. Prof. Lee stressed, "With RWD landscape fast growing, clinical pharmacologists should leverage the potentials of RWD/RWE in drug development by furthering its scientific innovation!" 

Prof. Lee's speech was well received by the audience followed by a welcome reception by JSCPT colleagues, whom he and other delegates have not seen in person for the past three years because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The night was full of talking, drinking, and singing! Both teams promised to meet again next year in Jeju, Korea, for the Spring Conference of 2024 KSCPT. 

Prof. Howard Lee was invited to Arirang TV New Show in the morning of April 7, 2023, which is World Health Day set by WHO or the World Health Organization. Prof. Lee talked about the implication of the day, coupled with the accomplishments by WHO, particularly for the last couple of years such as the global management of infectious diseases including the COVID-19 pandemic. Full details of Prof. Lee's interview can be watched at the following YouTube link. 

Yesol Hong won the Excellent Research Award at the 30th Annual Conference of the Korean Society for Clinical Pharmacology & Therapeutics (KSCPT), December 1-3, 2022, held at Bexco, Busan, South Korea. The title of YeSol's presentation was "One-year follow-up of patients with COVID-19: Analysis of new-onset disease after COVID-19 diagnosis using Real-World Data". She discussed the results of an analysis of the occurrence of disease in patients with COVID-19 over a year using two different real-world data sets. One of her analysis results was a nation-wide study, which was significant in that it included the largest number of study subjects among the studies analyzing the post-COVID-19-condition in Korea. Jung Hyun Won equally contributed to this study with Professor Howard Lee serving as the principal investigator.

Additionally, Siun Kim, Yoona Choi, David Seung U Lee also presented their research through poster exhibition at the conference. 

Full presentations can be watched at the following YouTube links: 

In an interview with Arirang TV, Prof. Howard Lee stressed the new BA.5 sub-variant of the Omicron Covid-19 could bring a new resurgence to Korea as early as in August. "The BA.5 sub-variant has started dominating the Covid-19 sub-variants in South Korea quite recently, which rose to 25% last week, almost tripled from 10% a week before." Prof. Lee also pointed out the super infectivity of BA.5 by saying "The BA.5 sub-variant is by far the most infectious variant we have seen." Prof. Lee continued, "Scientists call BA.5 immune-evasive, which means vaccination or previous infection doesn't help from getting it." Although BA.5 may pose a bigger health problem to the society as a whole, Prof. Lee did not agree to go back to strict measure in the past resurgences. The full video interview of Prof. Lee can be watched at the following YouTube clip. 

Prof. Howard Lee was featured at the first episode of FOCUS, a YouTube-based lecture program by Seoul National University Hospital, where Prof. Lee introduced each stage of new drug development. Two additional episodes will be aired through FOCUS soon, i.e., How Covid-19 vaccines were developed and how the Korean biopharmaceutical industry can be a global leader.  

Prof. Lee's first episode can be watched by clicking the following thumbnail; 

The Corona Fighters Live invited Prof. Howard Lee to go over the issues pertaining to the recent upswing of COVID-19 cases in Korea, in association with a book that he has just edited and published, entitled 'There is no such thing as K-Quarantine.' YeSol Hong and Jung-Hyun Won also contributed to the book as one of the co-authors.

In this talk, Prof. Lee shared a story as to why he came up with an idea of publishing a book that scientifically and systematically criticizes the flaws and defects of the K-Quranine, which has been praised by the Korean government. Prof. Lee disagreed, "The K-Qurantine is just a political propaganda. No reality is there." 

A full video can be watched at the following YouTube page.   

‘There's no such thing as K-Quarantine', coauthored by Prof. Howard Lee, Jung-Hyun Won, Yesol Hong and 13 others, was published on December 15, 2021. The book focuses on the problems, failures, and indignity of the K-Quarantine that are unlikely to be included in any government-published white paper. Prof. Lee, the editor and lead author of ‘There's no such thing as K-Quarantine', planned this book in a hope that the mistakes and failures associated with the groundless and unscientific K-Quarantine will not be repeated in the future when similar public health crises occur.

The book consists of four parts. Part one vividly describes how society overcome the adversities and difficulties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Jung-Hyun Won, Yesol Hong, and Prof. Lee wrote a chapter in Part one that summarized what had happened during the COVID-19 pandemic (i.e., 2020-2021) in South Korea and other countries (e.g., China, Japan, Israel), and reviewed how each country responded to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Part two presents the light and shadow of the K-Quarantine through the eyes and perspectives of experts in each field. In one of the chapters in Part two, Prof. Lee criticized the vaccine supply policy of the Korean government during the pandemic, which did not put much effort into securing a sufficient number of vaccine doses as early as possible, risking public health in South Korea.

Part three introduces the readers to the responses from other countries to the COVID-19 pandemic, followed by discussion how different they have been from the K-Quarantine. 

Part 4 summarizes a virtual forum discussion among the co-authors, which Yesol Hong, Jung-Hyun Won, and Prof. Lee organized. Yesol Hong, Jung-Hyun Won, and Prof. Lee prepared questions and agendas in advance, and Prof. Lee led the discussion.

In the preface, Prof. Lee commented, “Our future is not dark. We can do better next time by learning from the failure. I hope this book will may contribute to that transition. I dedicate this book to everyone who lost their precious lives due to COVID-19.”

On September 30, 2021, Prof. Howard Lee was invited to a live news show, COVID-19 Pandemic, by Arirang TV, an English-speaking broadcasting company in Korea. Prof. Lee introduced the current status of vaccine developments against COVID-19 in Korea, led and sponsored by local biopharmaceutical companies. According to Prof. Lee, there are 10 vaccine candidates in Korea currently under clinical development, phase 1 through 3. Fifty percent or five of those 10 candidates are still in phase I of clinical testing, with 4 and 1 in phase 2 and 3, respectively. Prof. Lee explained, "The vaccine platforms are as diverse as they can be." 

Toward the end of the show, Prof. Lee also discussed the issues pertaining to the vaccine development program by Korean biopharmaceutical companies as a follower. They include design issues, securing a full amount of comparative vaccines, multinational site management, and commitment of the government to purchase or pre-order the vaccine if successfully developed. More details of the news show can be watched by clicking the YouTube link below: 

Prof. Howard Lee emphasized the availability of oral drugs to transition back to the pre-pandemic normal in the midst of the recent increase in COVID-19 cases mainly driven by the highly infectious delta variant. In the COVID-19 Pandemic, a news show by Arirang TV, Prof. Lee detailed what are the prerequisites if the society as a whole can live with the corona virus. 

"Now, people are starting to realize there is an untapped area, probably of more impact, which is to help patients at early stage of the disease go through it in a milder and easier way, Oral COVID-19 drugs can facilitate this transition as smooth and fast as possible." Prof. commented. 

More comments by Prof. Lee can be found at the following YouTube link: