UNIVERSITY COLLEGE DUBLIN
HONORARY CONFERRING
Wednesday, 17 June 2015 at 3 p.m.
TEXT OF THE INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS DELIVERED BY PROFESSOR SIMON MORE on 17 June 2015, on the occasion of the conferring of the Degree of Doctor of Science, honoris causa on WAYNE MARTIN
President, Honoured Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,
In Ireland, as elsewhere, there are a number of national programmes to either control or eradicate diseases of farmed animals. These programmes are important, playing a key role in protecting public health, facilitating trade and boosting farm profitability. Traditionally, these programmes were the remit of government, but the farming industries are playing a much greater role in tackling animal health issues following the establishment of Animal Health Ireland. With AHI, Irish farmers are now actively working towards eradication of bovine viral diarrhea (BVD), Johne’s disease control and improved milk quality.
These programmes rarely run smoothly, and it is critical that decision-makers have clear and timely answers to questions that arise. Let’s take bovine tuberculosis as an example, noting that there has been a national programme in place for many years. TB is under good control in Ireland, but eradication has proved elusive. Over the years, some of the key questions have included:
Why has eradication proved so difficult … what are the constraints to progress?
Why does bTB persist in some areas and in some herds, often over some years?
Does wildlife, in particular badgers, play a role in maintaining infection within the cattle population?
If so, what sustainable solutions could be used to prevent the movement of infection from badgers to cattle?
This is where our colleague, Emeritus Professor Wayne Martin, has played such an important role here in Ireland. Since the early 1990s, he has been central to efforts to build scientific capacity and expertise in the area of veterinary epidemiology, a science focused on an understanding of disease, and of disease control, in animal populations.
Wayne first became involved in 1991, following an invitation to Ireland from the late Professor Emeritus Dan Collins, someone with whom we remember with very considerable affection. It was at this first visit that Wayne first met Liam Downey, Michael Sheridan and Ian O’Boyle, who with Dan have each contributed so much to the national TB eradication effort. Since this initial visit, Wayne has visited Ireland once or, since retirement, twice each year providing epidemiological expertise and mentoring support to many people, including postgraduate students. His input into the work of UCD’s Centre for Veterinary Epidemiology and Risk Analysis is particularly appreciated.
It is helpful, I think, to provide a little background about Wayne’s professional career, noting that he is one of the fathers of the discipline of veterinary epidemiology. Wayne completed a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) and Master of Science (MSc) from the Ontario Veterinary College at the University of Guelph in 1967 and 1970, subsequently completing his Master of Preventive Veterinary Medicine (MVPM) and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in veterinary epidemiology from the University of California Davis in 1972 and 1974. He joined the Ontario Veterinary College faculty in 1974, became a full professor in 1983, and was the founding chair of the Department of Population Medicine in 1978. He became a Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Science (equivalent to the Royal Society) in 2006, being one of the first four DVMs granted Fellowship in this Academy. He has published very widely in the discipline of veterinary epidemiology - over 200 scientific papers, including 25 on work here in Ireland. Wayne also co-authored the two seminal texts in this discipline: 'Veterinary Epidemiology, Principles and Methods' in 1987, and 'Veterinary Epidemiologic Research' in 2003.
Wayne has very strong links with Ireland, and also with farming. His great grandfather George Alexander Martin, with his wife Jane Anne and daughter Elizabeth, emigrated from Kesh in Co. Fermanagh in 1873, onboard the S/S Sarmation. From 1871 to the turn of the century, this ship sailed on multiple occasions from Liverpool to either Quebec or Halifax, generally via Derry. Wayne’s grandfather, John James Martin, was a major cattle dealer, and his father, George Morris Martin, was a beef farmer in Ontario, raising Angus stock and selling fattened steers at about 2-2.5 years of age.
Over the last 24 years, Wayne has greatly helped us to better understand the constraints and solutions to TB eradication in Ireland. We have been fortunate to have had a man of his qualities at our side, a man who has been so generous with his time and talents. This honorary degree is an opportunity for us to publicly acknowledge the outstanding contribution of Wayne Martin to Ireland, and to ongoing efforts here towards improved animal disease control.
Praehonorabilis Praeses, totaque Universitas,
Praesento vobis hunc meum filium, quem scio tam moribus quam doctrina habilem et idoneum esse qui admittatur, honoris causa, ad Gradum Doctoratus Scientiae; idque tibi fide mea testor ac spondeo, totique Academiae.