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Dr Sarah Walters

Associate Professor in Demography

LSHTM
Keppel Street
London
WC1E 7HT
United Kingdom

My background is interdisciplinary. I have a BA in history (Cambridge), MSc in Demography and Health (LSHTM) and PhD in historical demography in East Africa (Cambridge). I am interested in population dynamics and in how they intersect with wider socio-economic, environmental and political change.

I have worked at LSHTM since 2008, including a Wellcome Trust Postdoctoral Fellowship in Medical History and Humanities (2011-14), and leading the CRUK-funded Cancer Policy Programme (2014-17).

Affiliations

Department of Population Health
Faculty of Epidemiology and Population Health

Teaching

I am Programme Director for the MSc Demography and Health. I have taught across Demography and Health curriculum as well as more widely across the school. I am Module Organiser for Population, Poverty and Environment - a module in which we explore the interconnections between demographic, economic and environmental change and consider the implications for livelihoods. The course includes topics such as population growth & climate change, the history of population policies, migration & urbanisation, ageing, gender and women's empowerment, climate and reproductive justice, inequalities in health, and households and livelihoods. Previously I was joint Module Organiser of the course Population, Dynamics and Projections, and I continue to contribute teaching to that module. I was previously joint Module Organiser for DEM102 Population Studies and PHM History and Health. I taught for several years on the Cancer Survival Short Course, and on the modules Analysing Survey and Population Data, and Demographic Methods. I serve on the Demography and Health Course Committee and Exam Board.

Research

I work on demographic trends and estimation, with a particular focus on Africa. For my Wellcome Post-doctoral Grant I created the Counting Souls Project, aiming to improve the evidence base for long-term demographic trends in Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. I held a BA/Jisc grant to explore the use of machine learning to extract historical demographic microdata in Africa. I then held a Wellcome Small Grant to establish the African Population History Network which is fostering interdisciplinary exchange for a critical approach to population studies and policy in Africa. In 2021 we published a 'forum' on African population history in the Journal of African History, and held an international conference on African population history in Kenya. I have also collaborated on projects on ageing and the demographic impact of HIV/AIDS in Africa.

I am interested in how ideas about reproduction, health and the family change over time, and how ideational change can be measured and expressed in demography. My work is interdisciplinary – primarily at the interface between demography, anthropology and history. I enjoy finding creative synergies between disciplines and seeing how this enables critical thinking in public health, as well as exploring the challenges of this way of working.

I worked for seven years at the LSHTM Cancer Survival Group on measuring and explaining inequalities in cancer survival both within the UK, and internationally, and later leading the the CRUK Cancer Policy Programme. I have an ongoing interest in global health equity and social inequalities in health, and the relationship between research and policy.

Research Area
Ageing
Child health
Equity
Ethics
Fertility
Gender
Health inequalities
Maternal health
Reproductive health
Social and structural determinants of health
Demography
Epidemiology
Qualitative research
History of public health
Disease and Health Conditions
Cancer
Country
Malawi
Tanzania
Uganda
United Kingdom
Zambia

Selected Publications

Fertility and faith: The danger of a grand narrative
WALTERS, S; SEAR, R;
2022
Religion, Brain & Behavior
African Population History: Contributions of Moral Demography
WALTERS, S;
2021
The Journal of African History
Surgical treatment and survival from colorectal cancer in Denmark, England, Norway, and Sweden: a population-based study.
BENITEZ MAJANO, S; Di Girolamo, C; RACHET, B; MARINGE, C; Guren, MG; Glimelius, B; Iversen, LH; Schnell, EA; Lundqvist, K; Christensen, J; MORRIS, M; COLEMAN, MP; WALTERS, S;
2018
The Lancet Oncology
Becoming and Belonging in African Historical Demography, 1900-2000
WALTERS, S;
2017
Fertility, conjuncture, difference: anthropological approaches to the heterogeneity of modern fertility declines
Is England closing the international gap in cancer survival?
WALTERS, S; Benitez-Majano, S; MULLER, P; COLEMAN, MP; ALLEMANI, C; Butler, J; Peake, M; Guren, MG; Glimelius, B; Bergström, S; Påhlman, L; RACHET, B;
2015
British journal of cancer
Is sibling rivalry fatal?: siblings and mortality clustering.
Kippen, R; WALTERS, S;
2012
The Journal of interdisciplinary history
Temporal and geographic changes in stage at diagnosis in England during 2008-2013: A population-based study of colorectal, lung and ovarian cancers.
MULLER, P; WOODS, L; WALTERS, S;
2020
Cancer Epidemiology: the international journal of cancer epidemiology, detection and prevention
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