Manjulika Vaz ([email protected], [email protected])

Manjulika Vaz is a Social Scientist with over two decades of work with the social development sector. She graduated in Medical & Psychiatric Social Work from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai after her under graduation in Microbiology in Bangalore. Her doctoral work was in the ethics of biobanking and the role of public engagement. She is presently a researcher and faculty member at the Health and Humanities Division of the St John’s Research Institute at the St John’s National Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore. Her work focusses on the intersection between medicine and the humanities, science and society, technology advancements and bioethics. She uses qualitative research methods to understand cultural, social, attitudinal, and behavioural issues in health, illness and medical intervention. She has worked closely with the Bioethics Unit of the Indian Council of Medical Research to develop people centred research guidelines. She is a member of several Institutional Ethics Committees, conducts workshops and classes in research ethics and public health ethics and has a number of publications in bioethics in national and international journals. Her current areas of interest include the environment, climate change and planetary health, AI, digital health, narrative medicine, care given burden and chronic illness, anti-microbial resistance, public health policies and health systems research. She has played an active role in several National Bioethics Conferences including organising an Arts and Humanities festival for two of them. Manjulika is a Trustee of CIVIC Bangalore and is a founder member of SHADE Research Hub, UK.