Professor Russell Stothard

Biography

In 2011 Russell Stothard became Professor of Medical Parasitology at Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) and has continued to expand his interdisciplinary research on neglected tropical disease and malaria. With several LSTM colleagues, he has received large-scale research funding support from the Department for International Development, Wellcome Trust, and the National Institute for Health and Care Research. This funding has supported programmes that address important health issues in tropical regions of the world, advancing pragmatic solutions.

These large-scale multidisciplinary projects benefit from long term connections and collaborations with several African collaborators. A unifying theme is adopting One Health approaches to investigate aquatic ecosystem health and sustainable management within its broadest sense. This includes animal parasitology with a growing interest in the health and conservation of various non-human primates.

In Central Africa, his research focus is on Lake Malawi with Professor Janelisa Musaya and Dr Seke Kayuni. In East Africa his focus is on Tanzania and Zanzibar with Dr Shaali Ame and in West Africa focus is on Cameroon with Prof Louis-Albert Tchuem-Tchuente.

In 2019 Russell was awarded the C A Wright Medal by the British Society for Parasitology for multidisciplinary research on schistosomiasis and highlighting the importance of female and male genital schistosomiasis in Africa.

In 2002 he was awarded the Bicentenary Medal of the Linnean Society of London for epidemiology studies of urogenital schistosomiasis on Zanzibar and molecular taxonomic investigations of intermediate snail hosts.

Russell has also played major roles in learned societies. He sat on the Executive and Council of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (Hon. Scientific Secretary 2003-2010), Systematics Association & Malacological Society of London, having helped each society organise several scientific meetings as well as their AGMs. A particular highlight was organising the Centenary Meeting of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in central London in 2007 as well as their annual ‘Research in Progress’ and ‘Fresh From The Field’ meetings with the Royal Geographical Society.

From 2011-2016, he served as Honorary General Secretary for the British Society for Parasitology and has remained an active member of the Society since 1992, organising three Autumn Symposia: Progress in paediatric parasitology, Advances in diagnostics for parasitic diseases, and Host-parasite genetic diversity and co-evolution. In 2015, with Prof Mark Taylor and Dr Emily Adams, he organised the 2015 Spring Meeting in Liverpool with research focus on malaria, neglected tropical diseases and associated vectors.

Until 2024, with Prof David Rollinson, Russell was co-editor of the Elsevier serial volume Advances in Parasitology from 2011. He currently serves as editor-in-chief of the Cambridge University Press peer-review journal Parasitology and editorial boards of Infectious Diseases of Poverty and Journal of Helminthology.

Research interests

Russell’s main expertise is in epidemiology and control of schistosomiasis, undertaking multidisciplinary studies from molecular diagnostics to applied social science. He is particularly interested in other trematode flukes and their intermediate snail hosts.

Russell’s research has often translated into several World Health Organisation policy changes. He has presented, co-chaired and chaired several World Health Organisation expert committees of World Health Organisation Head Office/African Regional Office and assisted in the World Health Organisation 2022 guideline for schistosomiasis. In 2025 he was co-author of the Lancet Seminar Series Article on human schistosomiasis

A further research highlight was organising the Science+ two-day conference of the Royal Society in London addressing the importance of hybrid schistosomes in Africa.

Teaching

In 2020, Russell was granted a Senior Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy in recognition of undergraduate and postgraduate teaching experience.

He currently teaches on several MSc modules and co-directs with Dr Alexandra Juhasz and Dr James LaCourse the MSc One Health in Tropical Disease. He also contributes to the Diploma in Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, Diploma in Tropical Nursing, and other short courses at LSTM and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Russell has supervised the MSc and BSc research projects of over seventy students from University of Liverpool, Imperial College London, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, University College London, University of Cardiff and Royal Veterinary College, London.

He has also acted as external examiner for research projects in Global Health at St George’s University and undertaken external curriculum review of the MSc Control of Infectious Diseases at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Russel currently supervises five PhD students on topics related to neglected tropical diseases.

Selected research publications

Repeated biannual cross-sectional surveys in primary schools set baseline seasonal and spatial surveillance for malaria and schistosomiasis in the Shire Valley Transformation Programme (SVTP), Malawi – Journal: Current Research in Parasitology and Vector-Borne Diseases – Published: 9th January 2026

Clinical morbidity of single or mixed schistosome species infection in two communities of southern Malawi – Journal: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences – Published: 8th January 2026

Dynamic interactions between Schistosoma haematobium, Schistosoma mattheei and Schistosoma mansoni underscore the complex polyparasitism of intestinal schistosomiasis in southern Malawi – Journal: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences – Published: 8th January 2026

One Health insights into local transmission of zoonotic Schistosoma mattheei in southern Malawi – Journal: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences – Published: 8th January 2026

Public health challenge of hybridization in urogenital schistosomiasis: New insights and one health perspectives from Malawi – Journal: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences – Published: 8th January 2026

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