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| Steven Cummins Co-director Professor Geographer | Laura Cornelsen Co-director Associate Professor Public Health Economist MRC Career Development Fellow | Emilie Courtin Assistant Professor MRC Fellow Social Epidemiologist |
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| Oana Tanasache Research Fellow Economist | Amy Yau Research Fellow Social Epidemiologist | Judith Eling Honorary Research Fellow Public Health Registrar |
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| Nason Maani Assistant Professor Harkness Fellow Public Health Evaluation | Suzan Hassan Research Fellow Public Health | Emily Humphreys PhD Candidate Public Health Registrar |
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| Amanda Karapici PhD Candidate Systems Modeller | Denise Ndlovu PhD Candidate Nutritionist | Grace Turner PhD Candidate Environmental Epidemiologist Public Health Nutritionist |
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| Toby Watt PhD Candidate Economist | Alexandra Kalbus PhD Candidate Epidemiologist | Robert Greener PhD Candidate Computer Scientist |
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| Nicolas Berger Associate Member Honorary Research Fellow Social Epidemiologist | Samantha Hajna Associate Member Data Scientist | Vahé Nafilyan Associate Member Data Scientist |
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| Vanessa Er Associate Member Research Fellow Nutritionist | Richard Smith Associate Member Professor Health Economist | Rebecca Meiksin Associate Member Research Fellow Social Scientist |
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| Daniel Lewis Associate Member Data Analyst | Martine Shareck Associate Member Assistant Professor Social Epidemiologist | Claire Thompson Associate Member Senior Research Fellow |
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| Cherry Law Associate Member Honorary Research Fellow Economist |
Nicolas Berger
LSHTM profile Googlescholar ORCID @Nicolas__Berger
Nico is an Honorary Assistant Professor at LSHTM. His research interests are in the contextual and socio-environmental determinants of health, particularly diet and physical activity, and in the application of novel statistical methods. In his current project, Nico uses large disaggregated household food and beverage expenditure data to analyse the influence of policy and industry-led changes in food systems on household food and beverage consumption. He received his PhD in social epidemiology from LSHTM in 2018. Since May 2020, Nico works for the Belgian Scientific Institute of Public Health (Sciensano), where he leads the National Food Consumption Survey.
Laura Cornelsen
LSHTM profile Googlescholar ORCID @l_cornelsen
Laura is an Associate Professor in Public Health Economists. She is a public health economist interested in understanding linkages between public health and food systems changes, including the role of food prices as well as health-related food policies in influencing health outcomes. Laura has a MSc degree in Health Economics from University of York and a PhD degree in Economics from Trinity College Dublin. Her PhD work focused on the economic impacts of tobacco control policies in Ireland. After two years of post-doctoral work at the Leverhulme Centre for Integrative Research on Agriculture and Health (LCIRAH) on agri-health economics, Laura was awarded a fellowship in Economics of Health, funded by the UK Medical Research Council (MRC) in 2014. The fellowship work looked at the indirect impact of food taxes and subsidies on food consumption and population health in the UK. In 2017, Laura was awarded a Career Development Award by the UK MRC. Her current work focuses on analysing changes in the dietary patterns in the UK in the past five years using large disaggregated household food and beverage expenditure data and looking at whether food system changes (e.g. industry actions, regulation, policy drivers) have had an impact on what types of foods and beverages people buy and whether these could affect dietary health. Laura also has an interest in Discrete Choice Experiment methods for the prospective analysis of policy effects.
Emilie Courtin
LSHTM profile Google Scholar @EmilieCourtin
Emilie is an Assistant Professor at LSHTM. She is a social epidemiologist with an interest in the life course determinants of adult health. Her research combines social epidemiology and social policy to help better understand how non-medical policies influence health and disease. Her work is multidisciplinary by nature; she uses experimental and quasi-experimental methods to evaluate the long-term health effects of public policies shaping socioeconomic conditions, with a particular focus on education, income, family and housing policies. She currently holds a Skills Development Fellowship funded by the Medical Research Council (2020-23). Before joining PHI|Lab, Emilie was a David E. Bell Fellow at the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies. She obtained her PhD in social policy from the London School of Economics in 2018.
Steven Cummins
LSHTM profile Googlescholar ORCID @stevencjcummins
Steve is Professor of Population Health in the Department of Public Health, Environments and Society and Co-Director of the Population Health Innovation Lab (PHI|Lab). He is originally a geographer who moved into epidemiology and population health. He is currently interested in how the built environment affects health and the design and evaluation of the health impacts of environmental interventions. More recently he has begun thinking through whether complex systems theories and methods might offer a way to extend this work and be able to better understand and capture the wide range of potential health effects of social and environmental interventions in transport, food and welfare systems. Current work in which he is involved (alongside many others) includes evaluations of the introduction of taxes and levies on sugar sweetened beverages locally (Jamie’s Italian restaurants) and nationally in (the HM Treasury Sugar Tax), the health effects of transport infrastructure interventions and urban design on active travel, the role of food banks in the welfare system and the utility of agent—based models for investigations of the potential impacts of population health interventions in the food and transport systems.
Judith Eling
Judith is an Honorary Research Fellow at LSHTM and a Specialist Registrar in Public Health on the LKSS training scheme. Judith’s research interest is in the health and wellbeing impact of green and blue spaces. Her current work is a rapid review of impact of green space interventions for children and young people. Formerly a GP in refugee health, Judith is also qualified as a landscape architect (MLA Greenwich 2012) and starting working in Public Health in 2013, most recently at PHE’s Healthy Places Team and Surrey County Council.
Vanessa Er
LSHTM profile
Vanessa is a Research Fellow at LSHTM and works in the LSHTM School for Public Health Research. She has an academic background in nutrition and has expertise in mixed method research. Her interest in public health originated from her work experience at Bristol Public Health, working mainly in deprived areas of Bristol. That also sparked her research interest in health inequalities, ethnic minority health and participatory research methods. Her current work includes the evaluation of TfL restriction on HFSS (high fat, salt or sugar food and drink) advertising, critical review of system approaches in public health evaluation, and exploring the impacts of austerity on housing and health using Photovoice. Before joining LSHTM, Vanessa completed her doctoral research on diet and prostate cancer, and carried out research on children and young people’s health for DECIPHer and NIHR SPHR at the University of Bristol.
Robert Greener
GitHub
Robert has completed MSc Medical Statistics at LSHTM, as part of an MRC funded 1+3 scheme. He started his PhD in September 2020 focusing on using agent-based modelling to simulate the effect of transport interventions on physical activity and cardiovascular disease. Robert’s background is in Computer Science, specialising in Artificial Intelligence. His research interests include physical activity and the application of artificial intelligence methods, such as agent-based modelling and machine learning, to health.
Samantha Hajna
Googlescholar ORCID
Samantha is a Data Scientist and at PHI|Lab she worked on an HDRUK-funded project aimed at linking environmental exposure data to the UK Census. Her work explored the environmental determinants of health to inform the development and targeting of chronic disease prevention strategies. Samantha completed her undergraduate and MSc degrees at Brock University (St. Catharines, ON) and her doctoral training at McGill University (Montreal, QC) and conducted research at the University of Cambridge (MRC Epidemiology Unit) on the socio-environmental determinants of physical activity.
Suzan Hassan
LSHTM profile @suzan_has
Suzan is a Research Fellow in Public Health. She is a mixed methods researcher, with a keen interest in qualitative research methods. Her research interests include behaviour change, implementation science, health promotion and physical and mental health comorbidities. She is currently working on the evaluation of planning policy to regulate takeaway food outlets for improved health in England in collaboration with the University of Cambridge. She is working on the qualitative components of this project, where she is exploring the implementation and acceptability of this intervention from the perspectives of local authority officials and members of the public. She is also working on producing guidance on ways to better implement the policy in collaboration with local authority officials. She completed her PhD at University College London which focused on health promotion in people with severe mental illnesses, tying together her interests and experience in both mental health and health psychology. She also holds a Masters in Psychiatric Research and a Bachelors degree in Psychology.
Emily Humphreys
@emilyjhumphreys
Emily is a PhD student in social epidemiology and a public health registrar. She has an interest in the role of policy as a determinant of health and in the evaluation of public health policies and programmes. Her research uses quasi-experimental methods to evaluate the impact of parental leave policies on maternal mental health outcomes. She has an undergraduate degree in History from the University of Edinburgh, an MA in Politics from Royal Holloway and an MSc in Public Health from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. She is a Member of the UK’s Faculty of Public Health. Her experience as a public health registrar has included roles in East London NHS Foundation Trust and Public Health England; she was previously health inequalities lead for the Greater London Authority.
Alexandra Kalbus
LSHTM profile
Alexandra is currently a PhD student at LSHTM, Faculty of Public Health and Policy. In her PhD, she investigates the interrelations between physical and structural neighbourhood conditions and people’s food purchases in the UK, using large, complex datasets. The project has a strong quantitative focus by employing existing spatial-temporal analytical techniques and designing new ones over the course of the project. Alexandra holds a BSc and MSc in Health Sciences and engaged in research around both infectious disease and behavioural epidemiology.
Amanda Karapici
LSHTM profile
Amanda is currently a PhD student in Public Health and Policy at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and part of SPHR@L team. Her PhD research is focused on simulating the impacts of complex local food system interventions on diet-related health using spatial agent-based models. Amanda background is in Finance (BSc/MSc) with training in System Dynamics (MSc) and Business Administration (MSc).
Cherry Law
LSHTM profile ORCID
Cherry is a Honorary Research Fellow in Food System Economics at LSHTM and Lecturer at the University of Reading. Her research interests lie in the field of food, health and development economics. Cherry uses disaggregated household food expenditure data, product level trade data as well as state/region level data to understand the dietary impacts of government policies. Cherry holds a PhD degree in Economics from University of Kent and an MSc degree in Applied Economics from University of Nottingham. Prior to her PhD, She worked at the UNESCAP and the Food and Agriculture Organization.
Nason Maani
LSHTM profile TheCommonwealthFund Googlescholar ORCID
Nason is an Assistant Professor in Public Health Evaluation at LSHTM with a central interest in the structural and commercial determinants of health. His current work involves mixed methods research on the roles of commercial actors in shaping the production of knowledge, public discourse, and health inequalities, as part of the UKPRP SPECTRUM consortium. He also serves as an advisor to the Boston University/Rockefeller 3D commission on Data, Determinants and Decision-making. He is a 2019-2020 Harkness Fellow in Healthcare Policy and Practice, and previously served as a patient/public voice member on NHS England’s Clinical Priorities Advisory Group.
Vahé Nafilyan
LSHTM profile Googlescholar ORCID
Originally an economist, Vahé has interests in epidemiology and population health. He is currently interested in the social and environmental determinants of adult health and the evaluation of the health effects of social policies. He now works full time as Principal Statistician at ONS, where he leads the Health Modelling Hub, and conducts research projects aiming at helping the COVID-19 response. He completed a PhD in Economics at King’s College London.
Rebecca Meiksin
LSHTM profile
Rebecca is a Research Fellow in Social Science at LSHTM. Her current work includes qualitative analysis for the evaluation of TFL restrictions on advertisements of high fat, salt or sugar food and drink; and a systematic review of e-Health interventions addressing mental health, sexual health and substance use among men who have sex with men. Her PhD research focuses on the prevention of violence in dating and relationships among adolescents in the UK. Prior to LSHTM, Rebecca worked on HIV prevention in Ethiopia with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Other past work includes a systematic review of social norms and child sexual exploitation; research on racial disparities in veterans’ healthcare in the U.S. and an analysis of the relationship between domestic violence and maternal and birth outcomes in East Timor.
Denise Ndlovu
LSHTM profile
Denise is currently a PhD student in Public Health Policy at LSHTM. Her PhD will explore the nutrition practices of food banks and how they intersect with low-income household food practices using qualitative research methodologies. Denise is a Registered Associate Nutritionist after successfully completing a BSc in Human Nutrition at London Metropolitan University. She also holds an MSc in Nutrition for Global Health at LSHTM and worked briefly as a Research Assistant at LSHTM. Denise’s research interests include food security, inequalities, malnutrition and the social determinants of health.
Richard Smith
LSHTM profile
Richard was, until September 2018, Dean of the Faculty of Public Health and Policy and Professor of Health System Economics at LSHTM. He is now Deputy Pro-Vice Chancellor and Professor of Health Economics at Exeter University. He is currently involved in an evaluation of the UK Soft Drinks Industry Levy, and has worked closely with Laura Cornelsen on the economics of consumer choice for a number of years.
Oana Tanasache
LSHTM profile
Oana holds a PhD in Agricultural and Food Economics and an MSc in Agricultural Economics from the University of Reading. Her PhD examined the extent to which innovative sources of data such as mouse-tracking might be embedded into economic models of behaviour and might enrich our understanding of consumers’ nutritional decisions. As a result, she has developed an interest in using big data and novel sources of information to understand economic behaviours more generally. Prior to joining LSHTM, she held a postdoctoral research position at the University of Reading where she looked at the role of food supply chain initiatives in driving consumer trust in food and contributed to a social media analysis using Twitter data. Her current research interests lie at the intersection of agriculture, food policy and health economics. She is interested in using modelling techniques and innovative datasets to better understand food and health behaviours more broadly. Prior to academic career, Oana worked for the World Bank, the European Commission and UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA). Oana is also a member of the Centre for Global Health Economics (GHECO).
Grace Turner
LSHTM profile ORCID
Grace is a Research Assistant in Environmental Epidemiology. She is an Environmental Epidemiologist and Public Health Nutritionist interested in understanding linkages between public health and food systems changes, particularly how climate change impacts the food system, food security and subsequent health. She also has key interests in local, national and international climate action for health. Grace has a BSc degree in Human Biology from Loughborough University, a MSc degree in Nutrition for Global Health from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and is currently studying part-time for her PhD degree in Food Systems Resilience from the LSHTM. Her PhD work focuses on the resilience of the UK food system to climate change and the impacts on health, policy, and inequalities. Grace has been at the school for two years working on multiple projects within both the Health Protection Research Unit in Environmental Change and Health, funded by the National Institute for Health Research and ENBEL (Enhancing Belmont Research Action) funded by EU Horizon 2020. Grace is also a lead for a LSHTM public, patient involvement and engagement panel – PLANET – which engages the public in a range of research topics related to climate change and health in the UK. Grace has experience in literature reviewing, policy and qualitative analysis, stakeholder mapping as well as some expertise in statistical modelling.
Toby Watt
LSHTM profile
Toby is a senior Analyst at the Health Foundation and PhD student at LSHTM.
Amy Yau
LSHTM profile ORCID @amylaiting
Amy is a Research Fellow with interests in the social determinants of diet and health inequalities. In her current work, Amy is evaluating the impact of the TfL restriction on advertising of HFSS (high fat, salt and sugar) food and drink. Prior to joining PHI|Lab, Amy completed her PhD at CEDAR, University of Cambridge. Her PhD work explored social inequalities in diet, focusing on food insecurity in the UK and dietary differences by ethnicity and socioeconomic position. Amy has also worked in scientific publishing and has a Masters degree in Nutrition for Global Health from LSHTM.
Daniel Lewis
Googlescholar ORCID
Daniel was part of the PHI|Lab before taking up his current position as analyst team leader in Data Science & Innovation at the Care Quality Commission. He is interested in the explanatory potential of complexity science, a way of seeing the world that emphasises the interconnectedness of factors that produce health through the adoption of a ‘systems’ perspective. An emerging interest in ‘urban health’ and the health of city dwellers particularly lends itself to a complexity focus. Cities increasingly concentrate both opportunity and inequality, trends in the health and wellbeing of city dwellers cannot be fully explained as the linear combination of independent causal factors, but instead must be understood as being determined by a web of networked sub-systems acting together to produce population health.
Martine Shareck
Personal page
Martine is an Assistant Professor in Community Health Sciences at the Université de Sherbrooke. She has a strong research interest in the effect of urban environments on health practices and social inequalities thereof. Before moving to Sherbrooke, Martine was a Banting postdoctoral research fellow at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Canada, and at the Centre for Urban Health Solutions, St. Michael’s Hospital. She has trained in Epidemiology and Community Health (MSc) at the Université de Montréal and Public Health & Health Promotion (PhD) at the Université de Montréal.
Claire Thompson
Googlescholar ORCID
Claire was an Assistant Professor in the department of Public Health, Environments and Society (PHES) in the Faculty of Public Health and Policy, before she took up her current position at the University of Hertfordshire as a Senior Research Fellow for the Prevention and Early Detection in Health and Social Care (PEDHSC) Theme of the NIHR funded East of England Applied Research Collaboration. She is a qualitative researcher with interests in food poverty, urban inequalities, welfare reform, regeneration, applied health and social care research with local partners, and community responses to health inequalities.
