Awards

Olayinka Omigbodun of the University of Ibadan in Nigeria will build a critical mass of female researchers and policymakers to adapt and apply diverse mathematical models to better understand the epidemiology of depression in young women in sub-Saharan Africa and identify more effective preventative measures and treatments. Adolescent girls and young women in sub-Saharan Africa are three times more likely than their male counterparts to have a depressive disorder. Mathematical modeling provides a powerful means of predicting the dynamics of depression. However, there is a paucity of models that inform mental health strategies in this region. They will leverage existing research networks across the region to train new female modelers and, together with them, critique existing mathematical models of mental health and depression. This will enable the development of more suitable models, populated with local data, to identify predictors of depression in this group.

Alex Ario of Makerere University in Uganda, together with the Uganda National Institute of Public Health, the Ministry of Health of Uganda, and sister organizations in the East Africa region will expand their modeling capacities and establish collaborative research groups to apply modeling and data analytics to study health issues disproportionately affecting women. They will set up a multi-country steering committee to identify teams of modelers in Uganda, Kenya, and Rwanda. This committee will also select the most pressing women’s health issues and assign them to the modeling teams for investigation. They will also train modelers, particularly women, through on-the-job teaching and mentorship. The main findings from the collaborative studies will be disseminated to decision-makers and they will also advocate to influence policy.

Esnat Chirwa of the South African Medical Research Council in South Africa will strengthen modeling and data science capacities by incorporating training and networking approaches, particularly for female researchers in Malawi and South Africa. The rising disease burden in sub-Saharan Africa has resulted in the generation of many large, complex datasets; although these provide rich research resources, local analytical capabilities are limited. They will increase the number of female modelers and statisticians by providing financial support to seven female Biostatistics and Statistics master’s students, who will be mentored by their team, and a series of free, short in-person and online advanced statistics courses to over 90 more female researchers. They will also build networks between female researchers to facilitate collaborations on defined topics, including identifying the mechanisms driving women’s health outcomes in Southern Africa and the long-term impact of rape on mental health.

Sandra Agudelo-Londoño of the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogota, in collaboration with various partners across Colombia including Yadira Eugenia Borrero Ramirez at the University of Antioquia in Medellín, will apply gender-transformative and feminist-based approaches to data analysis to identify the structural barriers affecting women's health in Colombia. Women's health is a complex issue with biological, historical, sociocultural, economic, and political aspects. The Global South has few female data modelers and no training or mentoring networks for women. They have therefore assembled an interdisciplinary group of female scholars and will deploy five virtual training courses on an open and free educational platform, focusing on gender, feminism, and health data analysis, alongside political advocacy, and data-driven decisions. They will also create a health data feminist network and use an existing gender-specific health and social dataset to conduct a comprehensive analysis focused on health issues disproportionally affecting women.

Amira Kebir of the Pasteur Institute of Tunis in Tunisia will create an African-based and -led learning and research network that links Francophone and Anglophone African research institutions to strengthen the capacity and ecosystem for modeling and analyzing women's health in Africa. They will train eight Ph.D. and Postdoctoral researchers in an intra-African collaboration to use modeling approaches on available datasets that can inform public health decisions. They will also establish a summer school and workshops for training up to twenty students. These trainees will be incorporated into modeling groups by partners in northern, western, central, and eastern Africa that will apply mathematical modeling and gender-based data analysis to investigate four infectious disease areas that highly impact women, namely human papillomavirus, hepatitis B virus, COVID-19, and antimicrobial resistance. They will also build a software platform to standardize data collection and manage project information and data security.

Berge Tsanou of the University of Dschang in Cameroon will support trainee mathematical modelers in epidemiology, particularly women, to strengthen capacity and to investigate health problems related to human papillomavirus (HPV) and cervical cancer (CC) in four Central-East African countries. Both HPV and CC are affected by HIV, all of which disproportionately affect women, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. However, the nature of this interplay is largely unknown. They will synergize efforts across sub-Saharan Africa and use modeling approaches to study the co-evolution, prevention, and diagnosis of these diseases to enable earlier-stage treatments. They will support 30 master’s students, 14 PhD students, and three Postdoc fellows, at least 70% of whom will be female, and hold workshops to engage stakeholders and support evidence-based policymaking. They will also develop a dashboard and interactive software for ongoing disease surveillance in the region.