An Oxford grad who has worked with SMRU and COMRU, Sara Canavati, is a senior research scientist and infectious diseases epidemiologist who has conducted clinical trials and malaria studies in the Greater Mekong subregion for the last 10 years. She is a finalist in the Regional Malaria Champion Asia Pacific category, and was nominated by the Asia Pacific Malaria Elimination Network (APMEN).
Sara’s primary research interests include malaria elimination, drug efficacy studies; artemisinin and MDR resistance; and the mobile and migrant populations at higher risk of malaria.
An active social media user since 2008 when she did her MSc at the University of Oxford, Sara strongly believes that malaria advocacy is crucial for malaria elimination.
“Scientists can benefit enormously by using social media to promote their own work and stay current in other’s scientists work,” says Sara. “Importantly, social media is a powerful tool to engage non-science audiences in malaria control and elimination. It is a very rewarding activity that all scientists should get more involved in.”
Cameron Conway, a former Wellcome Trust-funded Poet in Residence at MORU, was nominated in the People’s Choice for Best Communications category. Cameron is the author of Malaria Poems, which was a 2015 Pulitzer Prize Poetry nominee.