Md. Taufiqil Islam
Dr. Md. Taufiqil Islam is an Assistant Scientist in the Mucosal Immunology and Vaccinology Unit, Infectious Diseases Division at the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b). He is involved with the program for the control of endemic cholera in Bangladesh and achieve the WHO’s target of End Cholera 2030 global roadmap. He is a Co-PI of a non-inferiority trial of the locally produced typhoid conjugate vaccine and an investigator in the Covid-19 and OCV vaccine effectiveness studies. He serves as a Co-Investigator of the Enterics for Global Health (EFGH) Shigella surveillance study where he is coordinating the diarrhea case surveillance component and involved with the training of staff, patient enrollment, data monitoring, and other study-related activities.
Dr. Islam obtained his MBBS degree from Mymensingh Medical College Hospital, University of Dhaka in 2008 and MPH degree from the American International University of Bangladesh in 2016. He completed a Diploma course on Vaccinology from Institut Pasteur, France and enrolled in the PhD program at Griffith University, Australia in 2020. He is currently doing his thesis work in the icddr,b as a remote PhD candidate.
Dr. Islam began his career as a clinical practitioner in 2008 and then I joined in the icddr,b in 2011. He has worked on different vaccine studies, such as Japanese Encaphalitis Vaccine, Flu Vaccine and Oral Polio Vaccine. He was actively involved with the implementation of the large feasibility study and a phase II trial of an oral cholera vaccine in urban Dhaka, Bangladesh and the development of cholera vaccine investment strategy. Evaluation of the safety of using whole-cell Oral Cholera Vaccines in pregnant women is another important area of scientific work to Dr. Islam. I contributed to the development of study proposals, implementation of the study activities, data analysis, and manuscript writing for the aforementioned studies. Moreover, he is involved in the vaccine delivery and surveillance network in the complex humanitarian crisis in Bangladesh in Rohingya community.
Dr. Islam was selected as a young affiliate of the world academy of science (TWAS) for the period of 2020-2024. He has obtained different national and international training, including epidemiological research design, basic and advanced statistical analysis, and scientific writing. He also participated in the 16th International Advanced Course on Vaccinology in Asia Pacific Regions in Seoul, Korea. Dr. Islam has published 35 peer-reviewed research articles as a co-author and is the first author of five peer-reviewed articles. He is a UW EFGH Rising Star Awardee studying, “Proportion of secondary Shigella transmission and predisposing factors for developing Shigella infection among household contacts in the EFGH catchment area, Dhaka, Bangladesh.”