Olufunmilayo Fawole is a professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Ibadan (UI) and an adjunct Professor at San Diego State University, USA. She was UI’s Dean of Public Health (2016-2020) and currently the Director, Office of International Programmes. She has published 201 papers with h-index of 35 and 5,232 citations (https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=pszgckcAAAAJ&hl=en). She has won 37 highly competitive grants as PI/Co-PI, totaling $14,729,854:00.
Stanford/Elsevier ranked her among the world top 2% scientists for four years (2021–2024) (https://topresearcherslist.com/Home/Profile/944920). She has collaborated extensively in research and policy engagements with international partners in South Africa, UK and US. She has led capacity-building across West Africa on field epidemiology through engagement with AFENET/NFELTP (https://www.ncdc.gov.ng/news/58/university-of-ibadan-and-ahmadu-bello-university-cohort-9-advert). She also led EU/ACDC-funded MPH with specialization in outbreak management (https://www.edctp.org/our-work/edctp-and-africa-cdc-epi-biostat-fellows/mphebdoer/). Through her work, she has contributed significantly to doctoral education across sub-Saharan Africa (https://carta-evidence.org/author/1000029450/;https://doi.org/10.1016/S2468-2667(24)00056-2). She has supervised 10 Fellowship, 5 PhD, and over 250MSc/MPH candidates.
A remarkable health systems leader, Fawole has led national and sub-national evaluations and outbreak investigations (DOI:10.1016/j.ijid.2014.03.1245;DOI: 10.11604/pamj.cp.2018.8.88.670). She provides technical expertise to governments and international partners that guide policy (https://nigeria.unfpa.org/en/publications/landscape-analysis-sgbv-harmful-practices-and-obstetric-fistula-nigeria-part-1;https://nigeria.unfpa.org/en/publications/landscape-analysis-sgbv-harmful-practices-and-obstetric-fistula-nigeria-part-2). With WHO, she led initiatives that supported Nigeria’s wild poliovirus-free certification https://docs.google.com/document/d/1lna8Q06jfxhM3i4Z8WxBEdzJYuirx5unC8ajYvj9vNA/edit?usp=sharing. She also contributed significantly to COVID-19 response in sub-Saharan Africa through her research findings (https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-023-15708; doi:10.1136/ bmjgh-2023-012700).
Fawole is a leading expert on gender-based violence (https://doi.org/10.1177/1524838008319255;https://doi.org/10.2307/3583347)and has initiated several landmark interventions (https://resilientyouth.net/) that have shaped national practices and positively impacted vulnerable populations. Her “Girls Invest” intervention, for example, provided financial literacy, vocational equipment and scholarships to 900 vulnerable girls (https://globalhealth.sdsu.edu/girls-invest/). Currently, she leads the Nigerian component of ALAMIME project that trains malaria programme officers across nine countries (https://alamime.musph.ac.ug/). She is a board member of clinical trials with the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (https://imwoman.lshtm.ac.uk/about-the-trial/). She served on the UI/UCH ethics committee and other boards