Dr Janelle Winters
Research Interests
I am an interdisciplinary postdoctoral researcher with a focus on infectious disease control policy. My research spans global health history, governance, and politics. I am particularly interested the role of narratives and imagery in global health and the impact of commercialisation on global health research and policies.
My doctoral research at the University of Edinburgh (supervised by Devi Sridhar) focused on the historical influence of the World Bank on global health. I used a case study of the Onchocerciasis Control Programme (OCP) to consider how the World Bank has built a unique health financing mechanism (trust funds) and channels for private investments (public-private partnerships) - and the impact that this has had on community health worker and investment ideologies in West Africa. My collaborative article "Interrogating the World Bank's role in global health" and forthcoming papers, "Constructing success in global health" and "The World Bank, the Godfather of global health", consider the origins of the Bank's epistemic, discursive, and financial power over the past forty years and why this matters today.
Currently, I am working as the COPCOV historian (supervised by Mark Harrison). This randomised-controlled, multi-country clinical trial is designed to measure the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine prophylaxis for COVID-19 in healthcare workers, and is sponsored by the Mahidol-Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Unit (MORU) in Bangkok, Thailand. My project, which I have deemed "A risky business", broadly considers the meaning and evolution of bureaucracy for multi-centre clinical trials since the 1990s. I am using the trial as a case study of how private companies (e.g., Big Pharma, contract research organisations, database management firms, insurance underwriters), politics, and risk management culture have impacted clinical trials during modern pandemics. My methods are interdisciplinary and grounded in the social sciences, including extensive oral histories, digital archive compilation, and document-based analysis. The COPCOV history project will run through 2023.
Background
I hold a PhD in population health sciences from the University of Edinburgh's global health governance programme (2020), a MA in the history of medicine from Newcastle University, a MS in epidemiology and public health from Yale University, and a BS in both zoology and history of science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Previously, I worked as a study director at the National Academy of Science's Board on Global Health on a pandemic influenza vaccine study ("The influenza imperative") and as a manager for U.S. Department of State, Department of Defense, and Centers for Disease Control & Prevention global health programmes.
Teaching and Supervision
My current position is 100% research, and I have taken on limited tutorials. Previously, I designed and taught undergraduate courses at the University of Iowa in the history of global health in the 20th century, ethics and politics in global health, and global health studies (cross-listed with sciences and anthropology). I have also guest lectured and served as a teaching assistant for graduate-level courses in epidemiology and investing in global health and development at the Asian University for Women and University of Edinburgh. I have interest in and experience supervising medical student, undergraduate, and Masters-level dissertations in global health governance and political economy.
