Dr Alex Aiken is a Clinical Associate Professor at LSHTM and a practicing physician in Infectious Diseases and Medical Microbiology. He conducted research work for his PhD into the epidemiology of hospital-acquired infections in Kenya. He conducted post-doctoral research in diverse projects including prevention of surgical site infections in African hospitals (the SUSP study with the WHO), transmission of antibiotic resistant bacteria in hospitals in Zimbabwe (funded by an AMS starter grant), re-analyzing an influential study on the impacts of mass deworming in western Kenya (with Calum Davey, funded by 3ie) and measuring the effects of a training intervention for hospital cleaners in Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania (the CLEAN study, with Wendy Graham and Giorgia Gon). 

He is now working on a new study on the impacts of bacteraemia (bloodstream infection) in African countries, specifically examining how much mortality impact is associated with ineffective antibiotic treatment. This study (the MBIRA study) with various African hospital partners, is funded by the Bill+Melinda Gates Foundation and commenced in early 2020. 

He is also a practicing clinician in the Microbiology Department of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, on a temporary basis.