Dr Buba Manjang BSc, MSc, PhD

• Post-Doctoral Research at University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada 2019
• PhD, University of Birmingham, School of Health and Population Sciences, Department of Public Health, 2016
• MSc in Public Health, National university of Malaysia, 2008
• BSc in Public and Environmental Health, University of The Gambia, 2004

Buba completed his BSc in Public and Environmental Health and worked for the Ministry of Health of the Government of The Gambia 2005 to 2006 as the Regional Vector Control Officer and then promoted to a Senior Health Administrator. Buba obtained a scholarship funding in pursuance of his MSc degree in Public Health at National University of Malaysia which he successfully completed in 2008. He again joined Ministry of Health in 2009 as the Regional Principal Public Health Officer until 2011.

Buba won another scholarship from the Islamic Development Bank (Merit Scholarship) in pursuance of a PhD in Public Health at the University of Birmingham. He is highly interested in researches at the level of community or public health interventions particularly in developing countries.

Since finishing his PhD, Buba returned to The Gambia, and in 2018 was promoted as the Deputy Director of Public Health, moving on to become the Director of the Directorate in 2020. Buba was a recipient of the Queen Elizabeth Scholarship (QEScholars) and worked on the Water Security as a Foundation for Healthy Communities and Sustainable Livelihoods project at University of Waterloo in Canada.

Buba was a key member responsible for COVID-19 control and management in The Gambia in the pandemic, when Gambia was reported as a yellow zone. Please see some of the work achieved by Buba in response to COVID-19 in The Gambia:

• The Chronicle: Gambia: Drop in COVID-19 Cases, Public Compliance Pay Dividends
• The Chronicle: COVID-19: How Gambian Frontliners Put Their Own Lives on the Line
• The Voice of Gambia: Fast Ali Restaurant, 3 Others Close For Breaking Covid-19 Safety Rules
• Dalhouse University News: "Diseases have no boundaries": Envisioning next steps in global health

Buba is a member of a consortium based at the University of Birmingham to expand, scale and trial his Gambia MaaChampion intervention in urban and rural Mali. This is £2mil 120 cluster RCT funded by Medical Research Council of UK, called the MaaCiwara Project.

Buba has taught at the MPH Global Health module on Rural Health in Africa at the University of Birmingham. He also taught undergraduate and students on how to conduct systematic review at University of Waterloo in Canada. In the Gambia he conducted trainings for health staff on immunization, disease surveillance, epidemic preparedness, control of communicable diseases etc at North Bank East Health Region in The Gambia.

PhD title

Investigating Effectiveness of Behavioural Change Intervention in Improving Mothers Weaning Food Handling Practices: Design of a Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial in rural Gambia. Supervisors:  Dr Semira Manaseki Holland, Dr Karla Hemming, Dr Chris Bradley, and also an external supervisor belated Dr Jeroen Ensink at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. This was an original research building on the work conducted by London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) in Mali, Bangladesh, and Nepal. This developing and important field of work, promises to provide an intervention that can be scaled-up in low income countries and thus through reducing the bacterial counts of weaning food, reduce diarrhoea morbidity and mortality in young children. This project was divided into 2 phases; phase one formative research and phase two cluster randomized controlled trial of 30 community intervention of weaning-food safety and hygiene in rural Gambia. The formative research gained approval by both ethics committee in the Gambia and University of Birmingham. The findings were used in the formulation of phase 2 intervention.

The intervention aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of a behavioural change intervention on mothers’ weaning-food preparation and handling practices in low and middle income countries. For this project we collaborated with LSHTM colleagues namely Prof Sandy Cairncross, belated Dr. Valerie Curtis, Dr. Wolf-Peter Schmidt. The project has since been adapted and scaled in the MaaCiwara Project in Mali in which Buba is a member of the consortium.

Buba is a member of the following research bodies:

• ResearchGate profile

• Member of Early Career Research Group (ECRAG) at school

• Science Development Network, Islamic Development Bank

• MaaCiwara consortium

Buba is part of other activities such:

• Gambia National Public Health and Environmental Officers Association
• Gambia Alumni Association of Islamic Development Bank graduates