Joint PhD Programme

Joint-PhDs are doctorates, which are done at two degree-awarding institutions. This doctorate means that you are fully registered in two universities, having to comply with admission requirements, and assessment regulations at both institutions, and it will result in one jointly awarded PhD (one diploma with the two university logos).

The other benefits for students are:

  • Access to complementary facilities and resources
  • Exposure to two cultural approaches to research
  • International student mobility
  • Enhanced acquisition of research and transferable skills, such as negotiation skills, use of videoconferencing, adaptability…
  • Better networking opportunities

Recently, Hawassa University and the University of Bergen agreed on such a joint PhD degree.

This programme is funded by The South Ethiopia Network of Universities in Public Health (SENUPH), and nine PhD students have been registered at the home institution which in this case is Hawassa University. The currently available financial support is for staff at Hawassa, Dilla and Wolaita Sodo universities. We plan to admit seven more students (four women and three men) in September 2016.

You can get more information about the admission requirements and about topics that this programme will prioritise by writing to Dr Eskindir Loha or to Professor Bernt Lindtjørn.

The structure of the joint PhD programme can be downloaded here.

Highland malaria in Ethiopia

Abebe Animut Ayele defenAbebe [1]ds on Friday 15 January 2016 his PhD degree at the University of Bergen with a dissertation:

“Anopheles species and malaria transmission risk in a highland area, south-central Ethiopia.” 

Anopheles arabiensis is the primary malaria vector in the lowlands of Ethiopia. In the highland Butajira area, a typical area of highland Ethiopia, the entomological aspects of the disease remain poorly described.

The study describes the entomological aspects of malaria transmission by highlighting on the abundance, host feeding preferences, entomological inoculation rates (EIRs) and risk of households’ exposure to malaria infectious Anopheles bites over two years. The study was done at three different altitudes ranging from 1800 to 2300 m.

Ten species of larval stages and nine species of adult stages of anophelines occurred in the area. The streams were the main breeding habitats of the anophelines. Anopheles arabiensis was the most prevalent species, and was found to feed on human and cattle with a similar preference. Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax infected Anopheles arabiensis and Plasmodium vivax infected Anopheles pharoensis were caught in the low- and mid-altitude villages. Also, houses with open eaves had higher density of malaria infectious Anopheles arabiensis.

Abebe Animut Ayele was born in 1968 in Gojjam in Ethiopia. He completed his bachelor’s degree in biology and his master’s degree in medical parasitology from Addis Ababa University where he works as a lecturer. He started his PhD training at the Centre for International Health, University of Bergen in 2008 with Professor Bernt Lindtjørn as main supervisor and Associate Professor Teshome Gebre-Michael as co-supervisor.

Abebe-coverThe thesis can be downloaded here 

The publications in his thesis include:

Animut A, Gebre-Michael T, Balkew M, Lindtjorn B. Abundance and dynamics of anopheline larvae in a highland malarious area of south-central Ethiopia. Parasit Vectors. 2012;5:117.

Animut A, Balkew M, Gebre-Michael T, Lindtjorn B. Blood meal sources and entomological inoculation rates of anophelines along a highland altitudinal transect in south-central Ethiopia. Malar J 2013; 12(1): 76.

Animut A, Balkew M, Lindtjorn B. Impact of housing condition on indoor-biting and indoor-resting Anopheles arabiensis density in a highland area, central Ethiopia. Malaria journal 2013;12(1):393.

Start of PhD programme at Hawassa University

In October, the PhD programme started at Hawassa University. This is a joint programme between Hawassa University and the University of Bergen.

Nine students started, and have chosen a research topic, and are working to finalize their research plans. Some of these topics include

  1. Community-based management of acute malnutrition
  2. Measuring the occurrence of maternal, neonatal and childhood diseases, and analyze their use of health services (two students)
  3. Can an intervention to reduce the oral and physical abuse by health workers on women during labour improve the health for the mother and child?
  4. Does intimate partner violence and depression during pregnancy adversely affect maternal health during delivery, and the health of the newborn?
  5. To describe the vulnerability to food shortages by examining food insecurity, food intake and nutritional status over one year in Wolaita.
  6. Is the nutritional transition taking place in Wolaita increasing the occurrence of non-communicable diseases such as hypertension and diabetes?
  7. Can better use of the iron-rich amaranth plant reduce the occurrence of iron eficiency anaemia?
  8. School health.

2015 Ranking of Ethiopian Universities

Top 10 Ethiopian U
During the last decade there has been a great increase in the number of Ethiopian Universities.

There are several methods of ranking universities. This is a ranking system with many pitfalls, but it gives an impression about the quality of work done at the institutions.

The top 10 ranking Ethiopian Universities are seen from the table.

For more information see the following web page: http://www.webometrics.info/en/Africa/Ethiopia

Strengthening malaria and climate research in Ethiopia

Lindtjorn-Malaria conference posterLindtjorn B, Loha E, Deressa W, Balkew M, Gebremichael T, Sorteberg A, Woyessa A, Animut A, Diriba K, Massebo F, et al: Strengthening malaria and climate research in Ethiopia. Malaria Journal 2014, 13:P56.

Poster presentation

The project “Ethiopian Malaria Prediction System” implemented from 2007 to 2012 combined new population-based malaria transmission information with climate and land use variability data to develop an early warning tool to predict malaria epidemics in Ethiopia. Scientists from Ethiopia and Norway collaborated to incorporate climate variability and forecast information for malaria epidemics.

Our study shows that the association between weather and malaria is complex. Statistical models can predict malaria for large areas. However, as malaria transmission varies and depends on local environmental conditions, we need to have good and local knowledge about each area. However, weather variability is the main driver of malaria in Ethiopia.

While the generation of precipitation depends on local ascent and cooling of the air, our research provided new data on the transport of moisture into the country that may improve weather forecasting. We developed a new classification of climate zones, have mapped drought episodes in Ethiopia during the last decades, and have improved seasonal weather forecasting. Our hydrology studies show that potential climate change differs among the Ethiopian river basins, with river flows being sensitive to variations in rainfall, and less to temperature changes.

The computer model, Open Malaria Warning, incorporates hydrological, meteorological, mosquito-breeding, land-use data, and cattle densities to find out when and where outbreaks are likely to occur. We validated the model with data for malaria transmission in the highlands and lowlands, characterizing malaria transmission over some years in both highlands and lowlands. This provided us with new knowledge on malaria transmission in Ethiopia, how intense the seasonal transmission is, and how malaria occurs in different populations and areas. Our study showed that indigenous malaria transmission during a non-epidemic year takes place above 2000 m altitude. We also showed the ideal temperature for malaria transmission is about 25°C, underlining that global warming may lead to increased risk of malaria in highland areas, and less in the lowlands with already high average temperatures. However, to validate such models, there is a need for several years of active monitoring of malaria cases and mosquito densities. Unfortunately, such data is rare in Africa, and we need to invest in long-term monitoring of malaria transmission.

Lindtjorn-Malaria conference poster

The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment

In May 2013, more than 480 researchers and 80 scientific organisations published a declaration condemning the use of the journal impact factor to measure scholarly success.  Journals and organisations such as Science, Proceedings of The National Academy Of Sciences (PNAS), Times Higher Education, and Wellcome Trust are among the organisations backing this call.

The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment states the journal impact factor is misused to assess the significance of work by scientists who publish in those journals. A number of themes run through these recommendations:

  • “the need to eliminate the use of journal-based metrics, such as Journal Impact Factors, in funding, appointment, and promotion considerations;
  • the need to assess research on its own merits rather than on the basis of the journal in which the research is published; and
  • the need to capitalise on the opportunities provided by online publication (such as relaxing unnecessary limits on the number of words, figures, and references in articles, and exploring new indicators of significance and impact)”.

The first and general recommendation is:  “Do not use journal-based metrics, such as Journal Impact Factors, as a surrogate measure of the quality of individual research articles, to assess an individual scientist’s contributions, or in hiring, promotion, or funding decisions.”

The declaration concludes that we need a cultural change where papers are mainly evaluated for their own scientific merit.

A note in Nature (2005) stated that research assessment “rests too heavily on the inflated status of the impact factor”. And the biologist Stephen Curry of Imperial College London wrote in a blog post: “I am sick of impact factors and so is science”.

South Ethiopia Network of Universities in Public Health

The Norwegian Programme for Capacity Development in Higher Education and Research for Development (NORHED) recently told us that we have been awarded the project:  South Ethiopia Network of Universities in Public Health (SENUPH): improving women’s participation in post-graduate education. 

The vision of this project is to enhance the capacity of universities in south Ethiopia to train sufficient staff for the Region to carry out essential public health work, and do essential research to improve the health of the people living in South Ethiopia. This will be carried out by:

  • Establishing, and strengthening a network of the main universities in south Ethiopia doing teaching so the universities can increase their teaching capacity and train enough staff to meet the demands within the public health sector.
  • Substantially increasing the number of women with postgraduate education
  • Increasing the number of teachers at the universities in public health.
  • Strengthening the research capacity through PhD and Master’s programme so the research done in the region will aid in defining the future health policy.

This project has four integrated parts:

  • A PhD programme for all universities and located at Hawassa University
  • A master programme in Maternal and Reproductive health at Dilla University
  • A master programme in Nutrition at Wolaita Soddo University and
  • A master programme in medical entomology (malaria control) at Arba Minch University).

By developing a network of the main universities in south Ethiopia we will address several important areas such as staff development, and enhance the human capacity in higher education, in public health, reproductive health, and nutrition and malaria control.

The Southern Nations, Nationalities  and Peoples Region in Ethiopia has a population of about 16 million people, representing  more than 50 ethnic groups that live in a variety of geographic and socioeconomic areas. The area is typical of Ethiopia with high population densities, high fertility and child mortality rates, and high maternal death rates.

South Sudan Medical Journal

On July 9th, 2011 South Sudan becomes an independent state. An historic day for South Sudan and for Africa. Most of the population in South Sudan have only experienced war. The country has the highest matenal mortality rates in the world (over 2.000 per 100.000 births).

During the last days I have attended “The first conference of Southern Sudan Medical Specialists”. About 70 of the existing 82 medical specialists from South Sudan attended the meeting. Many live abroad, some live in Northern Sudan and about half of them work in the south. Unfortunately, many specialists work in administrative positions. The details of an earlier survey is found here.

Although there are three medical schools in the country, none work now, mainly because of difficulties in transferring university functions from the north to the south.

The main topic discussed was to form a body to run, and to oversee medical specialist training in this new nation. I will update this page as documents are made available.

More information about the health situation in this country can is found at Southern Sudan Centre for Census, Statistics and Evaluation (SSCCSE), and from the Southern Sudan Medical Journal.

EMAPS 2011 Annual Meeting

The Ethiopian Malaria Prediction System (EMAPS)  Annual Meeting will be on Monday and Tuesday January 10 and 11 at Ghion Hotel in Addis Ababa.

We plan the meeting as an open scientific meeting, and malaria interested scientists in Ethiopia are invited to take part in the meeting.

We will have one or two lectures at the start of the workshop. Our main emphasis is on forecasting malaria epidemics, and we aim to build our scientific meeting around our modelling efforts.

We shall discuss this in thematic areas such as: mosquito dynamics and behaviour, human host infection (highland, and lowland areas), environmental (hydrology and climate/meteorology), and modelling (captures the whole or part of the information collected so far).

Hawassa University

Hawassa University is the oldest and largest university in the Southern Nations Nationalities and People’s Regional State (SNNPRS) in south Ethiopia. The University offers courses such as Medicine and Health Sciences, Natural and Physical Sciences, Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Resources Management, Law, Business, Humanities and Arts.

A few days ago I had a meeting with about 20 staff from the University. We discussed the current status of collaboration and how to strengthen the collaboration between the Hawassa University and Centre for International Health at the University of Bergen.

I was encouraged to learn the university now is about to launch a Masters programme and a Phd programme in public health. This will be done in collaboration with the Addis Ababa Institute of Public Health.

My presentation at the meeting can be downloaded here.