Dr Siobhan Johnstone

Dr Siobhan Johnstone is an Epidemiologist and Program Manager at Wits VIDA. Siobhan contributes to the Maternal Immunisation Readiness in Africa and Asia (MIRNA) Consortium by working on synthesizing in-country burden of disease data and identifying systems for capturing prospective disease data. She also leads the South African implementation of the Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance (CHAMPS) initiative. Her work focuses on reducing child morbidity and mortality by identifying and disseminating data on the causes of death in children, including stillbirths, in low- and middle-income settings. 

Siobhan holds a PhD from the University of the Witwatersrand, completed in collaboration with the Centre for Enteric Diseases at the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD). Her doctoral research centred on the epidemiology and aetiology of gastrointestinal infections in individuals over the age of five—a population with limited existing data. 

Previously, Siobhan worked as an epidemiologist at the NICD, where she conducted COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness studies using linked electronic databases. She also holds an MSc in Epidemiology and Biostatistics from the University of the Witwatersrand School of Public Health and has extensive experience in clinical trials and surveillance studies, including laboratory processes, ethics and regulatory compliance, and project management.