Dr Hossain Mohammad Shahed Sazzad

Dr. Sazzad received his Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) in 2002; Masters in Health Economics in 2005 and Fellowship in Infectious Diseases Epidemiology in 2008. His previous work experience includes medical care for people who inject drug and heroine smokes under Marie Stopes Clinic Society and CARE Bangladesh programme. His public health research experience includes identification of small clusters of hepatitis E through laboratory-based surveillance; blood-borne transmission of sporadic hepatitis E in Bangladesh. Sazzad led hospital-based surveillance for identification of immunodeficiency associated vaccine-derived poliovirus (iVDPV) cases as a part of Global Polio Eradication Initiative of World Health Organization. In collaboration with US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (US CDC) and Institute of Epidemiology Disease Control and Research (IEDCR), Ministry of Health, Government of Bangladesh, he led hospital-based Nipah encephalitis surveillance, research and outbreak investigation in Bangladesh over the past ten years. As an Associate Scientist in the International Center for Diarrhoeal Diseases Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b), he led minimally invasive tissue sampling study under Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance (CHAMPS) network, in collaboration with Emory University, US CDC and Ministry of Health, Bangladesh to identify etiology of under-5 deaths in rural Bangladesh. Currently, he has received Scientia PhD scholarship for his research work on understanding transmission of hepatitis C in Australian prisons. Sazzad’s PhD research focus is on molecular characterization of person-to-person transmission of HCV infection through next-generation sequencing and bioinformatic analysis; qualitative research on hepatitis C treatment as prevention in prison; and tracking trend of HCV epidemic through bioinformatics and population genetics. His primary supervisor is Professor Andrew Lloyd; co-supervisors are Professor Carla Treloar, Dr. Chaturaka Rodrigo, and Dr. Lisa Lafferty. His career mentor is Associate Professor Nicodemus Tedla.