Samira Mubareka

Dr. Samira Mubareka is an Associate Professor at the University of Toronto's Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology in tandem with her position as a Clinical Scientist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre. From 2020 to 2022, she was a member of the Ontario COVID-19 Science Advisory Table. She worked to isolate the SARS-CoV-2 virus and sequence its genome with other Canadian researchers. The isolated virus can be used to evaluate the efficacy of tests as well as the suitability of antiviral medications. Guidelines on the clinical management of severe acute respiratory infection with an expectant diagnosis of COVID-19 were written by Dr. Mubareka with assistance from the World Health Organisation. The recommendations call for close observation, oxygen therapy, the identification of co-infections, and chronic therapies.

Dr. Mubareka received her MD from Dalhousie University in 1999 and her training in internal medicine from McGill University in Canada in 2002. At the University of Manitoba, she obtained a specialty in medical microbiology and infectious diseases in 2005. In 2009, she began a research fellowship at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, working in Dr. Peter Palese's Microbiology Department lab. Dr. Mubareka concentrated on creating a new animal model for the influenza virus and became interested in the aerobiology of virus transmission, which continues to be a main area of research for her.

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