Dr. Wamai's current research is on health systems, HIV/AIDS and neglected tropical diseases (NTDs). Core areas are HIV/AIDS programming and cost-effectiveness analysis, male circumcision for HIV prevention, and health sector policy and reforms focusing on decentralization, insurance and financing in sub-Saharan Africa. His other research interests focus on HIV/AIDS, health and health disparities among African-born populations in the US.
Wamai has served as a Research Fellow in the Takemi Program in International Health at the Department of Population and International Health, Harvard School of Public Health. He previously worked and trained at the University of Helsinki, the Johns Hopkins University Institute of Policy Studies and the Bloomberg School of Public Health, the London School of Economics, the Nordic-Africa Institute in Sweden, the University of Nairobi in Kenya, and at the World Bank. Prior to his Harvard appointment, Wamai was a research associate at Oxford University Department of Social Policy researching on the shifting comparative welfare systems in the OECD and South Africa. Wamai has taught undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate courses in social policy, nonprofit studies, international development cooperation, and health policy in various universities in Finland, the UK and the US.
He has co-edited several texts such as “Civil Society Reconsidered: A Critical Look at NGOs in Development Practice” (IDS: Helsinki. 2006) and has published widely in leading journals such as Science, Future HIV Therapy, BMC Public Health, Journal of Public Health in Africa, Am J Prev Med, JMAJ, J Community Health, AIDS Care, J Int AIDS Soc and J Law Med. Wamai is the co-founder of the recently launched Integrated Initiative for Global Health at Northeastern University. He currently teaches courses on epidemiology and health disparities, African conflicts, global health and development.