Dan Hungerford

Dan Hungerford is a National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Postdoctoral Fellow studying the real world impact of vaccines in relation to inequalities, focusing mainly on GI pathogens.

Who are you a fellow for?

I am a Post-Doctoral Fellow funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR).

When did you start your fellowship?

January 2019.

What were you doing prior to your fellowship?

I am an infectious disease epidemiologist with expertise in gastrointestinal infections and vaccines, with an interest in health inequalities.

After finishing my Masters in Biological Sciences in 2005 and PG Diploma in Public Health in 2007, I worked at Liverpool John Moores University as a researcher in behavioural epidemiology. I then changed focus to infectious diseases, working for the Health Protection Agency as an Epidemiology Scientist. In 2014 I took up a research fellow post at the University of Liverpool, working on evaluating in use vaccines in the UK. I also studied for my PhD part-time, evaluating the impact of rotavirus vaccination in the UK.

Why did you choose to undertake your fellowship with the Faculty of Health and Life Sciences?

I chose to undertake my fellowship in the Institute of Infection, Veterinary and Ecological Sciences (IVES) in order to continue my work with Prof Neil French, Prof Miren Iturriza-Gomara and Prof Nigel Cunliffe. All of whom were very supportive of my fellowship application. The institute also has close links with Public Health England and my collaborator Dr Virginia Pitzer from Yale. Staying in IVES to start my fellowship was also appealing because it contains the NIHR Health Protection Research Unit in Gastrointestinal Infections and the Centre for Global Vaccine Research.

How does the NIHR fund your work?

NIHR provide three years funding including my salary, consumables and training budget, allowing me to carry out my research, travel to work with my collaborators, attend conferences and attend training courses to continue my professional academic development.

What do you study/ what is the aim of your research?

I study the real world impact of vaccines in relation to inequalities, focusing mainly on GI pathogens. My Fellowship is multi-disciplinary, combining epidemiology, laboratory science and mathematical modelling to predict risk of rotavirus diarrhoea in vaccinated children. 

What inspired you to look at this field?

Understanding the impact of vaccines in the ‘real world’ is critical, particularly as, apart from access to clean water, vaccines represent the best opportunity to control infectious diseases globally. Like many diseases, infectious disease disproportionately affects more deprived populations and therefore my research focuses on understanding the burden of GI disease in relation to inequalities. Hopefully enhancing research knowledge so that we can better deliver vaccines to those populations which need them most.