Prof. Mary Wells, dean of the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, offered a commentary to the Vancouver Province that explains why engineers are some of the hidden heroes of the COVID-19 pandemic.

She wrote it’s engineers who created technology that is helping so many Canadians endure this pandemic, through smartphones, Zoom, Netflix. It’s also engineers who helped build the tools needed to understand and treat COVID-19, using viral genome sequencing and hospital ventilators among other tools.

“Because of these technological advances, we are more equipped now than in any other era to respond to a pandemic,” she wrote, listing the many ways this pandemic differs from the 1918 influenza pandemic.

“Although engineers are not the front line medical responders who put their lives at risk each day in our fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, they are some of our hidden heroes whose work is critical to support people,” she said,

A respected materials engineer, Wells is the incoming dean of the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Waterloo.