About us

Preventing Global Disease

The St George’s Vaccine Institute is an independent, non-commercial, academic institution, which is part of St George’s University of London

25 Years Experience

The St George’s Vaccine Institute is an independent, non-commercial, academic institution, which is part of St George's, University of London and is co-located, and works closely with, the Clinical Research Facility @ St George’s University Hospital NHS Trust. It focuses on the epidemiology of vaccine-preventable diseases, human clinical trials of paediatric, pregnancy and adult vaccines and also studies vaccines against infectious diseases plaguing the most underprivileged members of the world.

Meet the Team

Opened in 1996

The first phase opened in 1996 as a combined clinical, scientific and educational facility, with the final official opening in 1998 by HRH The Princess Royal (November 1998 | The Royal Family). In 2006, Professor David Lewis, Director of the Institute commissioned a sundial and entrance mural to Marion Brandis. The sundial celebrated the work of the Institute over the last ten years and illustrated research on the diseases that had already been conquered, followed by those currently at the research stage and was officially unveiled by HRH The Princess Royal.

The Vaccine Institute was relocated to Jenner Wing in 2014 and the sundial remained outside Ingleby House, St George’s University of London. To learn more about the sundial, please follow the button below.

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Collaborators

The team consists of consultants in paediatric infectious diseases, adult infectious diseases and obstetrics as well as adult, obstetric and paediatric clinical research fellows, adult and paediatric research nurses, research midwifes and a project management team including clinical trial managers, project officers, data managers, administrators, a vaccine programme manager and the operations manager.

Director

Paul Heath
Co-Director

Dr Catherine Cosgrove
Professor

Mike Sharland
Professor

Kirsty LeDoare
Professor

Julian Ma

Director

Paul Heath

 

Paul Heath is a Professor and Honorary Consultant in Paediatric Infectious Diseases at St George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and St George’s, University of London, where he co-leads the Paediatric Infectious Diseases Research Group and is the Director of the Vaccine Institute. His particular research interests are in the epidemiology of vaccine preventable diseases, in clinical vaccine trials, particularly in at-risk groups and in perinatal infections.

He coordinates a European neonatal infection surveillance network (neonIN) and the UK Paediatric Vaccine Group (UKPVG), and other recent work includes national surveillance on neonatal meningitis, neonatal GBS and Listeria infections, maternal immunisation trials, studies of different vaccine schedules in preterm infants and COVID-19 vaccine trials (Phase I-III). He is Chair of the Research Committee of the European Society of Paediatric Infectious Diseases, Section Editor of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Journal (maternal & neonatal), Clinical Lead for Children’s research for South London and a member of the WHO GBS Surveillance Technical Working Group. 

Safety and Efficacy of NVX-CoV2373 Covid-19 Vaccine. 

Heath PT, Galiza EP, Baxter DN, Boffito M, Browne D, Burns F, Chadwick DR, Clark R, Cosgrove C, Galloway J, Goodman AL, Heer A, Higham A, Iyengar S, Jamal A, Jeanes C, Kalra PA, Kyriakidou C, McAuley DF, Meyrick A, Minassian AM, Minton J, Moore P, Munsoor I, Nicholls H, Osanlou O, Packham J, Pretswell CH, San Francisco Ramos A, Saralaya D, Sheridan RP, Smith R, Soiza RL, Swift PA, Thomson EC, Turner J, Viljoen ME, Albert G, Cho I, Dubovsky F, Glenn G, Rivers J, Robertson A, Smith K, Toback S; 2019nCoV-302 Study Group.  

N Engl J Med. 2021 Jun 30:NEJMoa2107659. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa2107659. 

Listeria infection in young infants: results from a national surveillance study in the UK and Ireland. 

Vergnano S, Godbole G, Simbo A, Smith-Palmer A, Cormican M, Anthony M, Heath PT. Arch Dis Child. 2021 May 13:archdischild-2021-321602. doi: 10.1136/archdischild-2021-321602. 

Systematic Review and Meta-Analyses of Incidence for Group B Streptococcus Disease in Infants and Antimicrobial Resistance, China. 

Ding Y, Wang Y, Hsia Y, Russell N, Heath PT. Emerg Infect Dis. 2020 Nov;26(11):2651-2659. doi: 10.3201/eid2611.181414. 

SARS-CoV-2 infection in pregnancy: A systematic review and meta-analysis of clinical features and pregnancy outcomes.

Khalil A, Kalafat E, Benlioglu C, O’Brien P, Morris E, Draycott T, Thangaratinam S, Le Doare K, Heath P, Ladhani S, von Dadelszen P, Magee LA. EClinicalMedicine. 2020 Aug;25:100446. doi: 10.1016/j.eclinm.2020.100446. Epub 2020 Jul 3.PMID: 32838230 

Safety and immunogenicity of the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 vaccine against SARS-CoV-2: a preliminary report of a phase 1/2, single-blind, randomised controlled trial. Folegatti PM, Ewer KJ, Aley PK, Angus B, Becker S, Belij-Rammerstorfer S, Bellamy D, Bibi S, Bittaye M, Clutterbuck EA, Dold C, Faust SN, Finn A, Flaxman AL, Hallis B, Heath P, Jenkin D, Lazarus R, Makinson R, Minassian AM, Pollock KM, Ramasamy M, Robinson H, Snape M, Tarrant R, Voysey M, Green C, Douglas AD, Hill AVS, Lambe T, Gilbert SC, Pollard AJ; Oxford COVID Vaccine Trial Group. Lancet. 2020 Aug 15;396(10249):467-478. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(20)31604-4. Epub 2020 Jul 20.PMID: 32702298  

Email:pheath@sgul.ac.uk

Secretary Phone:020 8725 3262

Co-Director

Dr Catherine Cosgrove

Dr Catherine Cosgrove is Infectious Diseases and Acute Physician who trained in London at King’s College Hospital, with her specialist training at St George’s University Hospitals Foundation Trust and the Hospital for Tropical Diseases. She has extensive clinical experience working in the UK and abroad, in district general hospitals and large tertiary referral hospitals.

Catherine completed her PhD in vaccinology at the University of London. She has been Chief Investigator and Principal Investigator on a large range of phase 1 to Phase 4 clinical vaccine studies, in addition to other studies looking at diagnosis in TB, genetic studies in TB and HIV, patient perceptions and knowledge of TB, HIV and vaccines. She is committed to improving knowledge of infectious diseases, with a special interest in TB and HIV and uptake of vaccines in under-represented groups. She provides teaching, training, question and answer sessions for a wide range of audiences, including secondary schools with a view to widening participation in medicine.

Clinically her NHS practice is in TB, HIV, Acute Medicine. It includes acute on calls and Infectious diseases inpatients, outpatients and on calls. The infectious diseases ward at St George’s is a dedicated 18 bedded negative pressure Infectious diseases ward which is part of the National Infectious Diseases network. She provides specialist care and advice on Infectious Diseases across South West London, Surrey and Sussex.

Catherine has many leadership roles including South West Sector Lead for Tuberculosis, member of the PanLondon Clinical Working Group for Tuberculosis and SW London lead for ambulatory care overseeing a major million pound expansion of the ambulatory care unit and an increase to 25% of the acute intake being ambulated.

Catherine is involved with many charities for children with special needs and is a keen swimmer and cyclist with a love of cooking.

Email:ccosgrov@sgul.ac.uk

Professor

Mike Sharland

Professor Mike Sharland is a leading expert in antimicrobial prescribing, resistance and healthcare associated infection in children. He is the lead clinical advisor for the neonatal and paediatric programme of the Global Antibiotic Research and Development Partnership (GARDP) and Vice-Chair and AMR lead of the Penta Foundation, a global Paediatric Infectious Diseases research network.

He previously Chaired the Department of Health’s Expert Advisory Committee of Antimicrobial Prescribing, Resistance and Healthcare Associated Infection (APRHAI). He has been an advisor for the WHO for many years. He is member of the Expert Committee on the Selection and Use of Essential Medicines and Chair of the Antibiotic Working Group of the EML/EMLc, assisting with the development of the Access/Watch/Reserve (AWaRE) grouping of antibiotics and WHO global targets on use.
Prof Sharland’s principal research interest is optimising the use of antimicrobials in children. At St George’s University London he leads a major program of research including global cohort studies and clinical trials to improve the evidence base for antimicrobial prescribing.

Tackling the Challenge of Antimicrobial Resistance in Children and Babies (sgul.ac.uk)

Professor

Kirsty LeDoare

Professor Le Doare joined the SGUL from Imperial College London in September 2018 as part of the Paediatric Infectious Diseases Research Group. She trained as a clinician-scientist in Paediatric Infectious Diseases in the UK, the Gambia and South Africa. Kirsty holds a Chair in Vaccinology and Immunology and is a Principal Scientist at MRC/UVRI@LSHTM in Uganda where she is developing a maternal vaccine platform and surveillance of pregnancy outcomes in a large urban cohort. She was awarded a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship in 2019. In the UK and in Uganda her main research interests are age-related immune responses to infectious diseases in pregnant women and their babies. She is interested in improving our knowledge of how maternal antibody in blood and breast milk is passed to babies and how this protects them from colonisation and disease and how we might improve this with vaccination. Her group leads several clinical trials of investigative vaccines in Uganda. She is jointly appointed to Public Health England as a principal scientist with the Pathogen Immunity Group, Porton Down.

Tackling Group B Streptococcus (sgul.ac.uk)

www.gbsatstgeorges.co.uk

Professor

Julian Ma

Julian Ma joined St. George’s in October 2003, leading a research team that specialises in immunology and the production of recombinant pharmaceuticals using plant biotechnology (molecular pharming). His research is particularly focused on using biotechnology tools to produce novel pharmaceutical proteins to improve global access to modern medicines.

Professor Ma graduated in Dentistry at Guy’s Hospital in 1983, where he also gained his PhD in Immunology under Prof Thomas Lehner, studying anti-microbial immunotherapy using monoclonal antibodies.

Professor Ma was the scientific co-ordinator of Pharma-Planta, from 2004-2011, a €12M European Union Framework Programme 6 project to develop pharmaceuticals from plant-derived proteins. He was subsequently awarded an ERC Advanced Grant to develop further plant biotechnology derived medicines to clinical trials. He is currently the Principal Investigator for Pharma-Factory, an €8.3M EU Horizon 2020 project to advance the commercial pipeline of products from molecular pharming.

He was the vice chair for the European COST Action on Molecular Farming from 2009-2013 that co-ordinated molecular farming research and policy activities in 28 European countries. He subsequently founded the International Society for Plant Molecular Farming and was the founding President 2013-2016.

UKPVG
Participants

St George’s Vaccine Institute is also part of The UK Paediatric Vaccine Group (UKPVG), an independent network of research institutions which, through collaboration, aims to further education, training and high quality research in the field of paediatric vaccines.

The Vaccine Institute welcomes students to do short projects with the team.

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Get Involved

Volunteers in research are essential. If you would like to subscribe to our healthy volunteers database or to our Patient and Public Involvement group.

You can view the report from our Participant in Research Experience Survey (PRES) 2021/22.

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