
Background
Daniela Katinka van Santen earned her bachelor's degree in Nursing and soon after completed the pre-master Health Sciences at the VU University of Amsterdam. In 2012 she completed her master's internship at the Public Health Service of Amsterdam (GGD Amsterdam) and the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT). In 2012 she obtained a cum laude master's degree in Health Sciences, specialising in infectious diseases.
In May 2018, Daniela completed her PhD training at the department of Infectious Disease Research and Prevention at the Public Health Service of Amsterdam under the supervision of Prof. Maria Prins, Dr. Ronald Geskus and Dr. Jannie van der Helm. Her PhD thesis is titled "Epidemiological studies on viral infections and co-infections: human immunodeficiency virus, hepatitis C virus and human papillomavirus”.
In 2016 she worked at the same institution as a researcher in the department of Epidemiology, Health Promotion and Care Innovation on the Amsterdam Health Monitoring study. Currently, Daniela is working as a post-doctoral fellow at the Public Health Service of Amsterdam and the Burnet Institute.
Key interests: viral infections and co-infections (i.e. HIV and hepatitis C co-infection) affecting key populations such as gay and bisexual men and people who inject drugs. As well as public health and complex epidemiological and statistical methods to analyse longitudinal data.
Key projects:
- International Collaboration on Hepatitis C Elimination in HIV –Coinfection (InCHEHC) – including 11 HIV cohorts from 7 countries.
- HIV and HCV co-infection elimination among gay and bisexual men in Australia.
- Harm reduction revisited: assessing the causal effect of harm reductions programs on -- HIV and HCV acquisition among people who inject drugs. This is also a collaborative project, which will include data from the Amsterdam Cohort Studies (Public Health Service of Amsterdam, Amsterdam) the SuperMix cohort (Burnet Institute, Melbourne) and ALIVE cohort (Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore).
Qualifications
- 2018: PhD, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands
- 2012: MSc, VU university, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
- 2010: BSc, Utrecht University of applied sciences, Utrecht, the Netherlands
Awards
- 2017: Spinoza travel award (Amsterdams Universiteit fonds) to attend the 6th International Symposium on Hepatitis Care in Substance Users (INHSU) – New York, USA
- 2017: Amsterdam Infection and Immunity travel grant – to attend the 20th International Workshop on HIV and Hepatitis Observational Databases (IWHOD) – Lisbon, Portugal
- 2017: Young investigator registration bursary – European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) – Amsterdam, the Netherlands
- 2016: Full scholarship award – 5th International Symposium on Hepatitis Care in Substance Users (INHSU) – Oslo, Norway
- 2016: Young investigator scholarship award – 21st AIDS conference – Durban, South Africa
- 2015: Best poster presentation – 15th European AIDS Conference (EACS), – Barcelona, Spain
- 2015: AMC young talent fund Louise Gunning Public Health Study Fund, specific Public Health course at Johns Hopkins University – Baltimore, USA
- 2015: Full scholarship award – 4th International Symposium on Hepatitis Care in Substance Users (INHSU) – Sydney, Australia
- 2014: Young investigator scholarship award – 21st Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) – Boston, USA
Positions
- 2017 – ongoing: Postdoctoral fellow at the Public Health Service of Amsterdam, the Netherlands
- 2018 – ongoing: Postdoctoral fellow at Burnet Institute, Melbourne, Australia
Burnet publications
View 21 moreLiver fibrosis regression in people living with HIV after successful treatment for hepatitis C
JAIDS Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes
Jim Young et al
Annual hepatitis C testing and positive tests among gay and bisexual men in Australia from 2016 to 2022: a serial cross-sectional analysis of sentinel surveillance data
Sexually Transmitted Infections
Brendan L Harney et al
Risk of Primary Incident Hepatitis C Infection Following Bacterial Sexually Transmissible Infections Among Gay and Bisexual Men in Australia From 2016 to 2020
Open Forum Infectious Diseases
Brendan Harney et al
Current projects

How stable housing can support people who use drugs (HOUSED)
Australia is experiencing a housing crisis, and people who use drugs are being left behind. To address this, we're analysing the social, economic and health benefits of stable housing for people who use drugs.

International Collaboration on Hepatitis C Elimination in HIV Cohorts (InCHEHC)
This is a multinational longitudinal cohort of people living with HIV who are at risk of hepatitis C virus infection or infected with the hepatitis C virus.