Richard White

Birds That Don't Exist: Niche Pre‐Emption as a Constraint on Morphological Evolution in the Passeroidea We use topological data analysis to reveal a persistent morphological gap in a major group of songbirds (superfamily Passeroidea). The gap remained unoccupied for millions of years, even though nearb...

Well damn, this is cool.

Birds That Don't Exist: Niche Pre-Emption as a Constraint on Morphological Evolution in the Passeroidea | Chia et al., 2026 | Ecology Letters

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

The potential impact of reduced international donor funding on the household economic burden of tuberculosis in low- and middle-income countries: A modeling study In a modelling study, Allison Portnoy and colleagues investigate the potential impact of reduced international donor funding on the household economic burden of Tuberculosis in low- and middle-income ...

New @plosmedicine.org

"eliminating all external funding for tuberculosis could lead to nearly 80 billion US dollars in additional household costs and more than 40 million extra households facing catastrophic costs"

journals.plos.org/plosmedicine...

👋Interested in studying @‌LSHTM?Join our upcoming Virtual Open Days (3-5 March 2026)

Book your place & attend live webinars & Q&A sessions with our programme directors, current students & student services to find out what makes LSHTM a unique place to study.

👉 www.lshtm.ac.uk/study/visit-...

Estimating the population impact of new tuberculosis vaccines depending on efficacy against infectious asymptomatic tuberculosis: A modelling study Hira Tanvir and colleagues estimate the potential impact of new tuberculosis vaccines under three scenarios of efficacy and conclude that to achieve the greatest impact, vaccines must prevent asymptom...

Our recent modelling study found that the estimated impact of new TB vaccines depends on the efficacy to prevent infectious asymptomatic TB. Read more in our paper out now in @plosmedicine.org!

journals.plos.org/plosmedicine...

Insights on the implementation strategies for a potential new tuberculosis vaccine in South Africa Several tuberculosis (TB) vaccines intended for adults and adolescents are in late-stage clinical trials, but there is limited research into how a new TB vaccine would be introduced. South Africa is a...

Our new paper on strategies for implementing a potential new #TB #vaccine in South Africa is now published in @plosglobalpublichealth.org!

doi.org/10.1371/jour...

Paracetamol is safe in pregnancy, says new evidence against Trump autism claims Researchers say their gold-standard review should put an end to the debate over use of the common painkiller during pregnancy.

No evidence taking #paracetamol in pregnancy raises risk of autism, ADHD, developmental issues

Ian Douglas says review "well-conducted" as excludes studies which don't take into account key differences between mothers who use or don't use paracetamol during #pregnancy

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

New workshop alert 🚨 We are organising a Symposium and Workshop on Socioeconomic and Ethnic Inequalities in Infectious Disease Transmission at the LSHTM on 22–24 April 2026. Sounds like something you're working on? Find out more and apply before 21st Jan 2026 iddconf.org/lshtm-sympos...

Thanks for highlighting this book. Just downloaded and looking forward to listening to it.Happy new year Madhu!

NEW PREPRINT!

We systematically reviewed molecular epidemiology studies looking at strain discordance in pairs of people with TB disease and history of household contact

We found 30 studies from 18 countries. Excluding 4 studies at high risk of bias, we had data on 1544 household case pairs

[1/n]

I think we all need some good news for global health and infectious diseases!

Excerpts from Copenhagen: The UNION World Conference on Lung Health 2025 Each year, many LSHTM TB researchers participate in the UNION World Conference on Lung Health, the world's largest conference on TB and lung health. This year, the conference takes place in

Join us 📆 9 Dec ⏰ 12.45 @tb-lshtm.bsky.social seminar
Free & Open to all
@kchorton.bsky.social @richardwhite321.bsky.social @reinhouben.bsky.social @dopapus.bsky.social @laragosce.bsky.social @danieljgrint.bsky.social

tinyurl.com/2s4y3jcd

With huge thanks to all the tutors, students and the @gatesfoundation.bsky.social for making this all possible!

Another successful "Intro to TB Modelling" course in Copenhagen at #WLHC2025. Over 70 joined to learn about TB modelling!

Followed by the now-traditional TB Modelling and Analysis Consortium social, which was also very well-attended and a lot of fun.

#5 Mathematical modelling and clinical trial simulation of TB prevention
mrc-lid.lshtm.ac.uk/2026-27-proj...
with Tom Sumner, @raclark18.bsky.social & @danieljgrint.bsky.social

Information for applicants - MRC London Intercollegiate Doctoral Training Partnership Studentships MRC LID studentship information for applicants How to Apply Projects Studentship funding Studentship options Studentship...

@lshtm-tbmod.bsky.social is offering multiple PhD opportunities through MRC LID, deadline 14 Jan. More details: mrc-lid.lshtm.ac.uk/applicants/
Projects include
#1 TB & screening
#2 TB & climate change
#3 TB & vaccines
#4 TB & influenza
#5 TB & prevention
@cmmid-lshtm.bsky.social @lshtm.bsky.social

What’s a #UnionConf without the TB modelling course? Packed room again for a long day of intro to modelling.
@lshtm-tbmod.bsky.social @tb-mac.bsky.social #WCLH2025 #TBSky

#3 How should countries deliver new TB vaccines when risk factors are considered?
mrc-lid.lshtm.ac.uk/2026-27-proj...
with @raclark18.bsky.social & @richardwhite321.bsky.social

Modelling Like an Experimentalist Dahlin et al. (2024) apply experimental thinking to a model of mosquito-borne disease transmissions.

"Validate With Simulated Truth: A first habit is to test whether an analytical pipeline can recover known conditions."

Very good advice below. So much COVID nonsense (e.g. 'immunological dark matter') basically came down to a non-identifiable model that hadn't been properly tested.

Projects - MRC London Intercollegiate Doctoral Training Partnership Studentships 2026-27 MRC LID POTENTIAL RESEARCH PROJECTS MRC LID is offering 40 distinct potential projects for...

Excited to say that we have a PhD project out on our age-sex research - looking at combinations of #AMR. With the fabulous @jodi-lindsay.bsky.social and Lanre Edun! Do get in touch for more information!

mrc-lid.lshtm.ac.uk/2026-27-proj...

UK to put 250,000 lives at risk from HIV, TB and malaria with aid cuts Exclusive: The UK is expected to pledge £850m to the Global Fund to Fight Aids, TB and Malaria – a cut of 15 per cent – despite previous assurances that funding would be protected

Ahead of The Union World Conference on Lung Health, Katherine Horton provides @the-independent.com with insights into the devastating impact of the funding cuts on global health, particularly tuberculosis.

Be sure to read about the threat of UK aid cuts: www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/poli...

Climate change and tuberculosis: an analytical framework Climate change is likely to exacerbate a range of determinants that drive tuberculosis, the world's leading cause of death from a single infectious agent. However, tuberculosis is often neglected in w...

Our framework that informed the @who.int TB & climate change policy brief out now in @lancetrespirmed.bsky.social, exploring the intersections and implications of climate change for the TB epidemic. Key message? TB should be considered a climate-sensitive disease
www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...

Announcement Awardees | TBVI Awards 2026 - TuBerculosis Vaccine Initiative Announcement Awardees | TBVI Awards 2026

✨ I’m so honoured to have been awarded one of this year’s TBVI Awards! ✨

I’m truly grateful for this recognition and excited for the opportunity to showcase my research at the TBVI Annual Meeting in January 2026.

#TBVI #tuberculosis #vaccines

tbvi.eu/announcement...

Tuberculosis and undernutrition: improving estimates to reinforce the policy imperative Undernutrition is a key driver of the global tuberculosis epidemic, increasing the risk of people developing tuberculosis disease and of poor outcomes in those who do.1 Each year, WHO publishes estima...

“Wow, I saw in the last GTB report undernutrition is much less important for TB than we previously thought” I hear you say…
Well, no. We think this is an underestimate, & as much as 28% of TB could be attributable to undernutrition – see our latest comment here: www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...

Impact of fluoroquinolone resistance on the cost-effectiveness of empiric treatment for multidrug- or rifampicin-resistant tuberculosis The WHO recommends the bedaquiline, pretomanid, and linezolid (BPaL) regimen with the additional fluoroquinolone antibiotic moxifloxacin (BPaLM) for initial treatment of multidrug- or rifampicin-resis...

When fluoroquinolone resistance status is unknown, empirical use of BPaLM (adding moxifloxacin to BPaL) is cost-effective as a replacement for BPaL even with high fluoroquinolone resistance levels! 🦠💊

doi.org/10.1371/jour...

A global analysis of patterns of tuberculosis exposure and transmission Tuberculosis (TB) is a major public health concern and the leading infectious cause of mortality globally. The disease exhibits strong prevalence patterns by age and sex, but the implications of these...

Understanding patterns of #TB exposure and transmission is needed for targeted prevention strategies. In our latest pre-print, @petedodd24.bsky.social and I estimated the proportion of TB exposure to and transmission from sex and age groups for 177 countries.

bit.ly/4nbV492

We are inviting applications for postdoctoral fellows in immunology of TB at the South African Tuberculosis Vaccine Initiative, University of Cape Town. For more information see the attached ad:

idm.uct.ac.za/media/739223

About half of people with #TB are asymptomatic (aTB). Calls have been made to stratify treatment and estimate incidence based on aTB case definitions

In this preprint we raise concerns that symptoms are an inadequate & inconsistent classifier of TB state, being highly influenced by context

⬇️link

Do no harm - re-evaluating the risks of overtreatment in community-wide tuberculosis screening Background Community-wide screening is a crucial strategy to end tuberculosis (TB), but a common concern is potential harm from overtreatment following false positive diagnoses. However, current refer...

In a new preprint (NOT PEER REVIEWED) we continue to explore the challenge of overtreatment in community screening. It seems the benefits of TB treatment far outweigh the harms, especially once we accept that sputum culture is not perfect. Important food for thought. www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...

New approaches for modelling tuberculosis transmission in low incidence settings at University of Bristol on FindAPhD.com PhD Project - New approaches for modelling tuberculosis transmission in low incidence settings at University of Bristol, listed on FindAPhD.com

PhD opportunity: New approaches to modelling TB transmission in low-incidence settings.
Supervised by Ellen Brooks-Pollock (Bristol), me (Bath) & Rajeka Lazarus (Bristol)
Apply: www.findaphd.com/phds/project...
Deadline 20 Oct
#PhD #Tuberculosis #Epidemiology #InfectiousDisease

Policy and Research | Global TB Caucus Discover the latest tuberculosis policy briefs, research insights, and evidence-based recommendations from the Global TB Caucus. Our Policy and Research page features global TB data, legislative frame...

Nice to see the latest #GlobalTBCaucus advocacy tool. This should come in handy for evidence-based fundraising as we face challenges in global health funding.
www.globaltbcaucus.org/policy-and-r...