Tolu Oni is a Public Health Physician Scientist and Urban Epidemiologist at the University of Cambridge, where she is a Professor of Global Public Health and Sustainable Urban Development. She is also Extraordinary Professor and Chair at Innovation Africa, University of Pretoria and an Honorary Associate Professor at the School of Public Health and Family Medicine, University of Cape Town.
She is Founder & Principal of UrbanBetter | Oni et al (https://urbanbetter.science/), an Africa-led global practice and movement to accelerate solutions that improve health in Africa’s cities by increasing the supply of health from place; and by creating a platform to increase youth-led demand for healthy places. UrbanBetter works in partnership with city governments, civil society and industry actors to design planetary health into urban infrastructure and development projects and policies in Africa and globally to harness urban development for population health and climate resilience.
Born in Lagos, she completed her medical training (and a BSc in International Health) at University College London, postgraduate medical training in the UK (Member of the Royal College of Physicians) and Australia, a Masters degree in Public Health (Epidemiology) at the University of Cape Town, and a research doctorate in Clinical Epidemiology at Imperial College London. She completed Public Health Medical Specialty training in South Africa and is a Fellow of the College of Public Health Medicine of South Africa.
She has published her work in high-impact journals, and has given presentations at international academic (urban health, planetary health, HIV, TB) and non-academic meetings including the United Nations High Level Political Forum for Sustainable Development, New York; and the World Economic Forum (WEF) Annual Meeting, Davos. She serves on several advisory boards including Future Earth and the African Academy of Science Open Research Platform; and is an editorial board member of Lancet Planetary Health, PLOS Global Public Health, Cities and Health, and the Journal of Urban Health.
Profiled in the Lancet journal in 2016, Science magazine in 2018, and the British Medical Journal in 2019, she is a Fellow of the International Science Council, the African Academy of Sciences, a 2015 Next Einstein Forum Fellow, and a 2019 Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum.
Air pollution is a deadly problem that both causes and is exacerbated by climate change. We must hold ourselves accountable for the harm it is causing.
A new study has investigated how urbanisation increases the risks of non-communicable diseases, like heart disease and what cities can do to reduce risks.
Urban spaces amplify or reduce the health risks encountered in daily urban life, from access to healthy food and physical activity to clean air and water.
Pre-COVID barriers to collaboration in health and education systems have been set aside in pursuit of the bigger picture, aligning with many of the SDGs.
The damage we have done to our planet is exacerbating the spread and severity of the COVID-19 pandemic - but our collective response shows all is not lost.
From who can access HIV drugs to how we plan our cities, health challenges frequently overlap with policy. But all too often, we don’t have the right evidence to make informed decisions, ...
