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Ben Cooper will deliver this talk entitled 'Drug-resistant bacterial infections in Southeast Asia: problems and possible solutions'.

Ben has been working as part of the mathematical and economic modelling  team since 2010 at the Mahidol Oxford Research Unit and has held an MRC Senior Non-clinical Research Fellowship since 2013. The main focus of his current work is the population biology of multi-drug resistant Gram-negative bacteria in hospitals in SE Asia and developing and evaluating a framework for rational antibiotic use.

His work uses mathematical modelling and statistical techniques to help understand infectious disease dynamics and evaluate potential interventions.  This involves building mathematical models to help evaluate the likely impact and cost-effectiveness of control measures,  developing and applying new statistical approaches based on mechanistic models for the analysis of longitudinal infectious disease data (increasingly making use of whole genome sequence data), and  designing and analysing epidemiological studies, with a particular focus on cost-effective interventions to reduce the burden of disease due to healthcare-associated infections.

Recent additional projects have  included a model-based  evaluation and cost-effectiveness analysis of seasonal influenza vaccination of children in Thailand (in collaboration with , Thailand’s Health Technology and Intervention Assessment Program) [1]. As part of this work his team obtained the first estimates of mortality due to seasonal influenza from a developing country in the tropics [2].

Other recent work includes the use of simulation experiments to investigate the consequences of different study designs for evaluating investigational treatments  for Ebola Virus Disease (including a group sequential RCT and  a novel multi-stage approach developed by Prof John Whitehead at Lancaster University).

Ben has also helped to promote the use of state-of-the art approaches for model-based data analysis through hands-on training and short courses throughout SE Asia and Europe. He has also been instrumental in setting up   an international network that aims to support mathematical modellers and their collaborators working on infectious diseases in the tropics.

Time to roll-out or rejection of  an investigational Ebola treatment under three study designs assuming 50% 14 day mortality in the standard care group: conventional RCT without interim analysis (red) group sequential RCT (green); and a multistage approach. Lines show means and shaded areas correspond to associated 5th and 95th percentiles. [3]

References

[1] Meeyai A, Praditsitthikorn N, Kotirum S, Kulpeng W, Putthasri W, Cooper BS, Teerawattananon Y. Seasonal influenza vaccination for children in Thailand: a cost-effectiveness analysis. PLoS Med. 2015; 12(5):e1001829. 

[2]  Cooper BS, Kotirum S, Kulpeng W, Praditsitthikorn N, Chittaganpitch M, Limmathurotsakul D, Day NP, Coker R, Teerawattananon Y, Meeyai A (2015). Mortality attributable to seasonal influenza a and B infections in Thailand, 2005-2009: a longitudinal study. Am J Epidemiol. 2015;181(11):898-907.

[3] Cooper BS, Boni MF, Pan-ngum W, Day NP, Horby PW, Olliaro P, Lang T, White NJ, White LJ, Whitehead J. Evaluating clinical trial designs for investigational treatments of Ebola virus disease. PLoS Med. 2015;12(4):e1001815. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1001815