Thierry Mertens

Thierry E. Mertens is since October 2021 Researcher at the Global Health and Tropical Medicine Network, following 3 ½ years working as Full Professor at the IHMT, NOVA University of Lisbon, Portugal. He holds a Medical Doctor degree and a PhD in Epidemiology. In the early 1980s, Thierry worked in Public Health and Clinical Medicine in the Caribbean and Kivu, Central Africa, before being appointed to the staff of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in 1985.

From 1986 to 1989, he directed a large health impact evaluation of environmental and structural interventions in South Asia, as well as various studies on child health in Burkina Faso. Together with the University of Mogadishu, Somalia, University “La Sapienza”, Italy, he worked on designing and conducting the first and last demographic (as of 2020) health survey of Merca, Somalia in 1989-1990.

As of 1988, he taught Epidemiology and created the first HIV teaching module at the LSHTM, while coaching Masters ‘students at the School and the Institute of Child Health until 1991 when he joined the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Global Program on AIDS.

From 1991, he worked within the United Nations System until 2015. Some of his appointments included Representative of the UN Secretary-General, UN Resident Coordinator and United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) Resident Representative (2009-2011), WHO Special Representative for Public Health in South- East-Asia (2007-2008) and Director of various departments at WHO Headquarters, Geneva (1997-2006).

His commitments in international research, social, public health and environmental policy development, implementation and evaluation focus on documenting economic determinants of biodiversity losses and related climate changes threats to human health and survival, reducing global disparities and absolute poverty, and ensuring that governments and citizens engage actively as priority agents of change through collaborative and transdisciplinary approaches.

Prof. Mertens is co-author of 6 books, 9 book chapters and many articles published in international peer-reviewed journals. He contributed to a variety of WHO, UN DESA, UNAIDS, UNDP, World Bank, IMF documents, training manuals and simulation models for the evaluation of HIV/AIDS Public Health prevention.

1. Mugli Z, Mertens T, Silva-Sa, Vaz D, Amado R, Teixeira AL, M Rosario O Martins. Migration as a determinant in the
   development of children emotional and behavioural problems: a quantitative study in Portugal. IJERPH, 2021.
2. Dye, C, Mertens, T, Hirnschall, G. et al.. “WHO and the future of disease control programmes”. Lancet 381 (9864) 2013: 413-418. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(12)61812-1.
3. Gerbase AC, Rowley JT, Mertens TE. (1998). Global epidemiology of sexually transmitted diseases. The Lancet 351: S2-S4. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(98)90001-0
4. Stonebumer RL, Low-Beer D, Tembo GS, Mertens TE, Asiimwe-Okiror G. (1996). Human Immunodeficiency Virus Infection Dynamics in East Africa Deduced from Surveillance Data. American Journal of Epidemiology 144 (7): 682-695. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.aje.a008981
5. Thierry Mertens, Peter Piot. (1997). The Epidemiology of HIV and AIDS. In AIDS: Etiology, Diagnosis, Treatment and Prevention, edited by De Vita V.T., Hellman S., Rosenberg S.A., Curran J., Essex M., Fauci A., 103-118. Philadelphia, United States: Lippincott-Raven.