What we do
01
Spatial epidemiology
Mapping and modelling approaches to identify, map, and predict high-risk populations and places for epidemic preparedness
We develop mapping and modelling approaches using diverse data sources that identify where disease risk is highest and why. Using on diverse data sources from routine health surveillance and census records to satellite imagery and digital trace data and combining spatial statistics, machine learning, and GeoAI, our work produces risk maps and predictive tools that help decision-makers understand how disease burden is distributed across populations and places, anticipate where outbreaks may emerge, and direct intervention where it will have the greatest impact.
03
Geographies of Health
Theoretical and methodological innovations to understand how environments shape diseases, health outcomes, and spatial inequalities
Building on the intellectual tradition of health and medical geography and integrating the latest advances in big data, AI, and disease ecology our research asks fundamental questions about why space and place matters for health and how that relationship can be measured, modelled, and acted upon. This work pushes the boundaries of what geographies of health can look like, and what they can contribute to public health in an era of rapid environmental and social change.
Projects
Mapping Vulnerability during Brazil’s Dengue Crisis
This project aims to identify factors of structural inequality and assess to what magnitude they interact to disproportionately expose disadvantaged populations to dengue fever; and to evaluate the effectiveness of current control strategies in mitigating outbreaks in disadvantaged communities.
Mapping Health Equity: Equitable Intelligence For Emerging Infections (EI2)
This project aims to develop and evaluate an equitable AI-driven infectious disease surveillance and mapping platform that integrates socio-environmental, individual, and underrepresented health data to identify populations and places at greatest risk of infection, improve pandemic preparedness and enable equity-focused public health responses in the UK and beyond.
GAHEL is supported by
Our work has been funded by
02
Social Determinants of Health
Investigation of the social and structural pathways through which inequalities are produced and reproduced across populations and places
Where people live, work, and move shapes their exposure to disease in ways that are consequential but complex, and our research works to untangle how socioeconomic, environmental, and biological factors interact to drive unequal health outcomes. By identifying the structural roots of these inequalities, our work supports the design of policies that address the conditions that make some populations more vulnerable than others.