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Dr. Tisu Mvalo: A ‘Homegrown’ Investigator Who Trains Learners, Cares for Young Malawians

October 30, 2023
The analogy “give a man a fish or teach a man to fish,” demonstrates the essential role training can play in global health. When a doctor takes care of one child, that care is for one child only. But when a doctor can train other doctors to care for young...

NICHD Grant Award Enables Researchers To Address Reasons For Vertical Transmission of HIV in Malawi As the Country Pursues Elimination Goals: Integrated Educational Cores Represent the Best of Capacity Building with Malawian Health Leaders

August 15, 2023
Led by Mina Hosseinipour, MD, MPH, the NIH’s National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), has funded the project “Preventing Infant Infections with Implementation Science in Malawi.” (PRI3SM). The program, in partnership with the Republic of Malawi’s Ministry of Health, comprises three studies to address gaps in prevention services,...

Mvalo Appointed Commissioner for Oxygen Security for Lancet Global Health

March 24, 2023
Tisu Mvalo, MD, assistant professor of pediatrics and in-country pediatric director of UNC Project Malawi, has been appointed Lancet Global Health Commissioner for Oxygen Security. Medical oxygen security refers broadly to all the policy, economic, infrastructure, technology, supply chain, logistics, clinical guidelines and health workforce required to ensure that pulse oximetry and...

UNC Project Malawi, Baylor Global Hope and Kamuzu Central Hospital Form Hematological Malignancy Board

March 7, 2023
Hematological malignancies, including leukemia, lymphoma, and myeloma, are cancers that affect the blood, bone marrow, and lymphatic system. In Malawi, these cancers account for a significant proportion of cancer cases, and their treatment requires a multidisciplinary approach. To answer this need, UNC Project Malawi, Baylor Global Hope and Kamuzu Central...

Friday Saidi Receives Scientific Achievement Awards

January 28, 2023
Friday Saidi, MBBS, MMED, is first author of two papers published in 2021, that received Scientific Achievement Awards at UNC Malawi. The papers include: Term gravid uterus in a congenital umbilical hernia: a case report, published in the Journal of Medical Case Reports. Contributing IGHID authors include: Maganizo Chagomerana, PhD, Lameck Chinula, MD,...

NIH grant expands capacity to train emerging cancer researchers in Malawi

September 28, 2021
  A five-year training grant from the National Institutes of Health’s National Cancer Institute expands the capacity of UNC’s Institute for Global Health & Infectious Diseases and Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center to train the next generation of cancer researchers in Malawi, Africa. The Malawi Cancer Outcomes Research Program, or M-CORP,...

Report from Malawi: Weathering a second wave—or tsunami—of COVID-19

February 10, 2021
  By Mina Hosseinipour, MD, MPH Officials announced the first confirmed case of COVID-19 in Malawi on April 2, 2020. At UNC Project Malawi, we’d been working for a month to carefully review and prepare for the virus. We established COVID preventive procedures and clinical management guidelines and planning for...

NIH awards $25 million to UNC’s Global HIV Clinical Trials Unit

November 30, 2020
  The National Institutes of Health has awarded University of North Carolina’s Institute for Global Health & Infectious Diseases nearly $25 million over seven years to continue operating its Global HIV Clinical Trials Unit, or CTU. The new funding will support HIV treatment and prevention in adults, children and pregnant...

Malawi-based team receives $500,000 to improve capacity for sickle cell care, research

October 12, 2020
  A team of researchers led by UNC Project-Malawi has received a one-year, $500,000 grant to build clinical and research capacity in Malawi to better diagnose and treat children with sickle cell disease. The funding is a joint award from the NIH’s National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute and National...

UNC-led consortium to study HIV-related cancers in sub-Saharan Africa

August 24, 2020
A team of UNC researchers are partnering with colleagues at four institutions in Africa to study HIV-associated malignancies. With a five-year, $6 million grant from the NIH’s National Cancer Institute, the research consortium will look at screening and diagnosing innovations for three cancers common to people with HIV: Kaposi sarcoma,...

In memoriam: UNC Project-Malawi colleagues pay tribute to Dr. Peter Kazembe

August 20, 2020
Our dear friend, Dr. Peter Kazembe, a Malawian colleague, pediatrician and adjunct professor of medicine with the University of North Carolina’s Institute for Global Health and Infection Diseases, died on August 11, 2020 at the age of 65 while receiving treatment for cancer in South Africa. He is survived by...

Remembering Steve Meshnick: Colleague, mentor and friend

August 6, 2020
“There are few people like him,” as a long-term collaborator and friend said. “Steve was so humble and generous that I don’t think he really understood the impact he had on the people around him. He profoundly changed for the better the lives of so many people he worked with...

‘A global effort’: Report from Malawi

April 7, 2020
Irving Hoffman, international director of the Institute’s UNC Project-Malawi, offers this report as the country recorded its first death from COVID-19. As of April 8, 2020, despite limited testing, Malawi has recorded 10 COVID-19 cases with one death and some evidence of community spread. UNC Project-Malawi is taking a leading...

Grant boosts antimicrobial resistance efforts in Malawi

February 18, 2020
The Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases and UNC Project-Malawi were awarded a $4.5 million grant by the UK’s Fleming Fund to strengthen Malawi’s One Health Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) program.  The grant will support the national AMR coordination committee and technical working groups, supporting ownership and alignment and scaling up a One Health AMR...

Researchers at UNC Project-Malawi publish record number of journal articles

January 29, 2019
Researchers at UNC Project-Malawi published 124 articles in scientific journals in 2018, setting a record for UNC Institute for Global Health’s global sites.  Twenty-six of the manuscripts featured Malawian first authors. “Our unit celebrates every publication manuscript coming from UNC Project-Malawi, especially those featuring a Malawian first author,” says Maga...

Friend’s death inspires med student to apply for research fellowships

April 24, 2017
Robert Flick is a student at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. He has completed both the Doris Duke International Clinical Research Fellowship and the UJMT Fogarty Global Health Fellowship. In this blog post, he shares how these fellowships allowed him to conduct operational research in Malawi and pay tribute to a...