Volunteers fill out questionnaires at the Big Day Out music festival. Photo: M. Lim
HIV, hepatitis C, sexually transmitted infections, malaria, tuberculosis and drug and alcohol misuse are serious health concerns in Australia and the Asia and Pacific Region. It is an enormous challenge to reduce the impact of these diseases and behaviours, particularly in highly vulnerable populations and disease endemic areas.
The Centre for Population Health implements novel, multidisciplinary scientific programs that use cutting-edge epidemiology, high quality laboratory science, excellent clinical and social research, and strong public health principles to address these major health problems in our region.
The Centre for Population Health undertakes a broad spectrum of work, ranging from research that helps to better understand the priority diseases and their transmission and ecology, to discovery science with potential for longer term benefits such as therapeutics and vaccines, to health systems oriented research that directly influences health policy.
Areas of specific research interest are:
Alcohol and other drugs
Alcohol and other drug use is a major public health issue, costing the Australian community an estimated $55 billion per annum. While injecting drug use is associated with numerous health and social harms (accounting for the vast majority of hepatitis C infections and fatal drug overdoses), there is a renewed focus in Australia on alcohol use and its related harms. The Centre for Population Health conducts research designed to measure the nature and extent of alcohol and other drug use over time, with a view to developing effective policy responses. This work is done in collaboration with colleagues from other institutions in Australia and overseas.
Hepatitis C
An estimated 170 million people are infected with the hepatitis C virus. Hepatitis C is associated with considerable mortality and morbidity, particularly due to cirrhosis of the liver and liver cancer. The Centre’s research focuses on improving understanding about hepatitis C virus infection and transmission, with the ultimate aim of developing a hepatitis C vaccine. Staff at the Centre for Population Health conduct innovative studies involving people who inject drugs (the group most at risk of infection with the hepatitis C virus) and collaborate with virologists, immunologists and mathematical modellers in Australia and worldwide.
HIV/AIDS
It is estimated that over 30 million people throughout the world are living with HIV and more than two million people have died from AIDS. In Australia, new diagnosis of HIV continues to increase after declining for many years in the 1990s. In Victoria in 2007 there were 263 HIV notifications reflecting the highest annual total since 1987. The Centre aims to reduce HIV transmission in the Australian population; by managing and developing innovative surveillance systems for the Victorian Government, and by undertaking research involving the groups most at risk and vulnerable to HIV; including men who have sex with men, injecting drug users and people from culturally and linguistically diverse communities.
Malaria
Malaria continues to be one of the major global public health problems. As many as one billion malaria episodes are experienced each year and more than two million deaths occur, predominantly in young children in the poorest communities. Close to two and a half billion people live at risk of malaria, and recent evaluation of the global burden shows that one billion of these live in the Asia and Pacific region. The Centre’s malaria program extends from basic laboratory research, through molecular epidemiology, to large field trials of anti-malarial therapy in children in Papua New Guinea, to provide evidence for more effective control and treatment.
Sexually Transmitted Infections
Chlamydia, a sexually transmitted infection is the most commonly notified infectious disease in Australia. It predominately affects young heterosexual men and women and there were over 60,000 new notifications in 2007. If untreated, Chlamydia trachomatis infection is a major cause of pelvic inflammatory disease and tubal infertility in women. The Centre aims to reduce the impact of chlamydia on the community by reducing transmission and increasing the number of young people tested and treated for chlamydia. This is done through a combination of innovative surveillance and developing outreach testing and treatment programs.
Tuberculosis
Despite global efforts to control the major public health menace of Tuberculosis (TB), the number of cases worldwide is increasing. Tuberculosis drug resistance is a significant threat to TB control programmes internationally, all the more worrying with the emergence of the extremely drug-resistant TB, XDR-TB that is resistant to almost all of the TB drugs currently available. Consequently most infected patients die. The Centre for Population Health is working on the epidemiology and health systems implications of the emergence of drug resistant TB.