School of Public Health

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Wits School of Public Health

This multi-disciplinary school produces skilled public health practitioners addressing the range of public health needs and challenges within South African and African settings. Our undergraduate and postgraduate teaching programmes embrace a range of public health disciplines, including community medicine, epidemiology and biostatistics, health policy and advocacy, health economics, occupational health, rural health and social and behavioural change communication.

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Research Day 6 November 2025

Got research that matters? Share it! The 2025 Research Day theme: Accelerating Equitable Policy and Practice through Public Health Research in Africa. Submit your abstracts today and contribute to advancing knowledge and practice in African public health.

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Research Entities at the School

Centre for Health Policy The Centre for Health Policy (CHP) is one of the few multi-disciplinary health policy units in South Africa and has over 20 years of research experience. As an academic research group, CHP actively seeks to draw together theoretical insights and empirical evidence in understanding health system change and in proposing strategies for future health systems development.
PRICELESS SA The intent of PRICELESS SA is to provide information that will improve the way in which resources are allocated and priorities are set to improve public health. The aim of PRICELESS is to support the development of evidence-based information and tools in order to help determine how best to use existing scarce resources.
AGINCOURT MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit (Agincourt) runs the Agincourt Health and Demographic Surveillance System (HDSS) which surveys approximately 107 500 people annually and has a unique dataset describing the changing pattern of rural mortality, non-communicable diseases, and nutrition.
SARCHi Chair The first South African DSI/NRF Research Chair at a South African or African University to focus exclusively on the health workforce. The Chair is held by Professor Laetitia Rispel, who works with a small team of dedicated and committed health systems researchers.
Social Determinants of Health and Health Inequality The Sheiham programme’s bold and ambitious goal to generate new knowledge and foster a collaborative and interdisciplinary programme through teaching, research, and social activism has never been more important in contemporary South Africa.