Curriculum Vitae

Barrie Maxwell Margetts

British Citizen, born in Perth Australia 17th July 1952; resident in UK since 1985.

3. Present Appointment
Professor of Public Health Nutrition, School of Medicine, University of Southampton,
4. Previous/other Substantive Appointments
Dates / Appointment
2011- / Visiting Professor, King Saud University, KSA
2010 / Scientist, WHO, Genève
1999-present / Visiting Professor, North West University (formerly Potschefstroom), South Africa
2009-present / Visiting Professor, University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia
1993-2001 / Senior Lecturer/Reader, University of Southampton
1986-1989 / Nutritionist, MRC Environmental Epidemiology Unit, University of Southampton, working with Professor David Barker
1978-1985 / Research Officer in the National Health and Medical Research Council Unit in Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, University Department of Medicine, Queen Elizabeth II Medical Centre, Perth, Western Australia
5. Qualifications
Date / Title of Award / Subject / Class / Awarding Body
1975 / BSc
4 year degree / Anatomy &
Human Biology / (Hons 2:1) / University of Western Australia
1978 / MSc / Human Nutrition / University of London
1985 / PhD / Epidemiology / University of Western Australia
6. Major Honours and Distinctions
Date / Honour/Distinction
1990 / Registered Public Health Nutritionist
2004 / Fellow Faculty of Public Health
2009 / Honorary Doctorate, North West University

7. Highlights in Postgraduate Education, professional development and consultancies

·  I developed and directed the first MSc in Public Health Nutrition in the UK in 1996, currently half of the students come from Europe, and half are International students. The curriculum reflects this international perspective

·  I developed and led the European Summer School in Nutritional Epidemiology which ran from 1989 to 2002, students came from all over the world. I subsequently ran similar training programmes in The Caribbean, South east Asia and Africa. The text Design Concepts in Nutritional Epidemiology arose out of these programme

·  In 1986 I was a co-founder of the UK Nutritional Epidemiology Group; this group undertook a number of reviews and tasks for the Department of Health, including a systematic review of the evidence link nutrition to cancer which formed a critical part of the governments policy on diet and cancer.

·  I established and lead professional affairs in the UK Nutrition Society which developed standards for professional practice in Public Health Nutrition; this included course accreditation.

·  In 2011 I was the international consultant on an Australian Government funded project renewing curriculum development in public health nutrition in Australia.

·  I regularly undertake reviews of postgraduate education and training programmes in the UK and across Europe, as well as reviews of research programmes for various funding councils ( for example, I have reviewed a number of MRC units in South Africa, and the Human Nutrition Department at Wageningen University in The Netherlands).

·  I have successfully supervised about 40 PhD students in the UK form UK and overseas, and through UNW in South Africa and in other African countries.

·  I regularly exam PhDs for institutions across the world.

·  I regularly review for the NRF in South Africa.

·  I currently run a module on Public Health and Policy at the University of Vienna, and have been a regular contributor to postgraduate courses across Europe.

Recent consultancies undertaken

·  DFID consultation in Bangladesh on the next five year development plan, and in particular evaluation of the National Nutrition Programme.

·  Consultation for the World Bank and Iranian Ministry of Health and Medical Education in Iran on the development of postgraduate education in nutrition.

·  Lesotho Government: Ministry of Health, development of National Nutrition Policy.

·  UNICEF/WHO review of impact of multiple micronutrients on pregnancy outcome.

·  WHO Consultancy on developing guidelines and review of diet and health.

·  WHO Consultancy on global review of nutrition policies. This was a review of nutrition policies in all Member States.

·  WHO Europe; Review of nutrition in primary health care in Europe.

·  WHO Western Pacific Region review of weekly iron and folic acid supplementation in women of reproductive age.

8. Past Research and Scholarship

There are four broad strands of work that I have been engaged in, and played a key role in developing, over the last 20 years:

·  aetiological research related to diet, activity and NCD, particularly from a developmental origins perspective;

·  research focusing on undernutrition;

·  development of an evidence based approach to nutrition research;

·  applied research and development aimed at achieving change.

9. Summary of relevant active research and scholarship in Public Health Nutrition

Three broad areas:

·  workforce and capacity development in Public Health Nutrition

·  Applied research, service and development

·  Primary Research

9.a Workforce and capacity development

Over the past 15 years the Institute has been engaged in a range of educational and capacity building activities around the world. Over the more recent past there has been a focusing of activity on the development of the public health nutrition workforce, both in terms of fitness for practice and competency issues for the core professional group, as well as enhancing the wider context in which this ‘expert’ role can be maximally effective.

9.b Applied research, service and development

Recent national (Wanless Report, Choosing Health) and international (Millennium Development Goals, Commission for Africa) reports highlight the series state of public health and our collective failure to achieve improvements in health amongst the most vulnerable. Within the UK (and beyond) it is clear that health promotion has to be strengthened; we do not have the resources to rely on treating problems once they arise. The Institute of Human Nutrition’s work in DOHAD is increasingly being focused on interventions aimed at promoting health, both in the short term for vulnerable young women, but also to reduce their risk, and the risk of their offspring in later life.

About ten years ago we published research which showed that second generation babies of South Asian origin were no bigger than first generation babies, and still considerably smaller than the general population. These young women that were born small were more likely to have low Hb levels as teenagers. We felt that we needed to communicate these findings to the local community; this lead to arrange of activities under the banner of Breaking the Cycle, which have won a number of local and national awards for innovation and excellence in health service work. Our ongoing engagement with the City and local service provider organisations and structures has developed out of this initial experience.

A major area of intervention research has been in the local Southampton community- we have spent a lot of time establishing networks and supporting the infrastructure, and we are now beginning to have an influence on service delivery plans aimed at improving nutrition and health, particularly in children. We have mapped all the current local programmes and we are now working to build in to routine service delivery tools to assess the effectiveness of these programmes, particularly in relation to achievement of national targets for halting the rise in obesity in 11 year old children.

9.b.1 Southampton Initiative for Health/Food Choice (including Food choice action group)

The University has an ambition to engage more effectively with the City of Southampton for mutual benefit. The City has a health and wellbeing strategy with nutrition related health as a key plank of activity. The university has developed a number of ‘threads of activity that are designed to help improve health in the local community, while also addressing wider research agenda, for example, of the MRC and Department of Health.

Current focus

A major activity that has brought together partners from across the university and city has been encapsulated by the Food Choice action group (which I chair). This activity has arisen out of findings from the Southampton Women’s Survey that women of low educational attainment (a proxy measure for wider issues) have a poorer quality of diet. The challenge is to do something about this. A programme of work has been developed with an ultimate aim of developing an intervention to improve the diet of the most vulnerable group.

The project has been developed in stages:

1) Qualitative research among the target group to identify constraints to behaviour;

2) Systematic review of community based nutrition interventions to learn from past work;

3) Mapping of existing programmes aimed at improving the health of the target group that are already in place, and including some attempt to review the impact of these programmes;

4) Cross-sectional survey of the target group to explore the generalizability of findings form qualitative research, and also to establish the link between constraints (attitudes, peer and family pressure etc) and dietary behaviour;

5) Development and delivery of intervention: training the trainers intervention in children’s centre workforce.

9.b.2 Development of National Nutrition Policy for Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

The government of The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia have, through the King Said University, established a national nutrition policy chair to help the government develop a coherent national nutrition policy for the country. I have been acting as a consultant and visiting Chair to guide the background work required to develop the evidence base for the policy as well as to guide the development of the policy.

9.c Primary Research

The broad aim of research in Public Health Nutrition is to strengthen the evidence base for the effectiveness of interventions and programmes of work aimed at improving nutrition related health and well-being. Some selected highlights are indicated below.

9.c.1 Mumbai Maternal Nutrition Project (Mumbai, India)

The main hypothesis is that enhancing the micronutrient quality of women’s diet from pre-conception to delivery improves both fetal growth and functional outcomes in their children. This trial is nested within a longer term project designed to empower women to independently improve their own nutrition and that of their children. For projection of the project to the public and to the community involved, we have coined the name ‘Project Saras’ (‘Project Excellent’).

9.c.2 Ongoing collaboration with North West University, South Africa

Collaboration began about ten years ago with a mix of training/capacity building and research activities. Research collaboration began with the THUSA study where we provided help on data analysis. Some key areas of outcome from this work include elucidation of the impact on nutrition transition on health and the interplay between nutrition and HIV in this population. Other projects have included:

·  Food Fortification programme in South Africa - a PhD student from South Africa has just finished a controlled trial of the effectiveness of food fortification on the nutritional status of children. This work has been published.

·  Development of a Nutrition Policy framework for Lesotho- A PhD student from Lesotho developed a policy framework for nutrition for Lesotho, and we have been working with the Ministry of Health to implement the programme.

Current active projects include:

9.c.2.i PLAY study

This was an exercise intervention study in children living in the township community around Potchefstroom; it showed that previously stunted children who increased their activity were able to alter their body composition and potentially reduce their risk of metabolic syndrome. We are currently exploring ways to expand this important work.

9.c.2.ii Follow up on THUSA/PURE study

This follow- up of THUSA focuses on the urban community around Potchefstroom and a rural community to explore the impact of changes over the last ten years on nutrition related health. We are currently cleaning the data ready for analysis.

9.c.2.iii Nutrition and HIV: ongoing secondary analysis of previously collected datasets in Africa

Three PhD students have recently completed their PhDs on secondary analyses of existing datasets from different populations in South Africa. The main aim of these analyses was to explore more fully the impact of nutritional status and diet on disease progression and effectiveness of ARV therapy.

10. Academic and Professional Activities Outside the University

World Public Health Nutrition Association

I was elected as the first President of the World Public Health Nutrition Association (www.wphna.org) ; currently chair of organising committee for Rio 2012 congress; currently chair of editorial board of World Nutrition.

The Nutrition Society

·  I was until August 2002 Honorary Professional Affairs officer of the Nutrition Society with responsibility for overseeing all aspects of professional affairs in the society.

·  I founded and was the first editor-in-chief (for nine years from 1998) of the international journal, Public Health Nutrition.

Accreditation Committee

9. Publications

Books edited

Margetts, BM and Nelson, M., eds. (Second edition) Design Concepts in Nutritional Epidemiology. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1997. (first edition 1991)

Margetts BM, Thompson R, Speller V, McVey D. Health and Lifestyle Survey 1993. London: HEA 1998.

Gibney M, Margetts BM, Kearney J, Arab L (eds) Public Health Nutrition. Blackwells Scientific , 2004

( in addition to editing the text I contributed two chapters)

Hughes R and Margetts BM. Practical Public Health Nutrition. Wiley 2011

Chapters in books (incomplete)

Margetts BM. Vegetarian diets and blood pressure. In: Nutrition and blood pressure. Editor P Burszten. J Libbey, London 1987:5-16.

Landman, J, Buttriss J, Margetts B. Curriculum design for professional development in public health nutrition. In: Public Health and Nutrition. Eds. BM Kohler, E Feichtinger, E Dowler, G Winkler. Edition sigma, Berlin, 1999. 267-277.

Buttriss,J, Wiseman M, Margetts B. Implications for Health. In Plants: diet and health. Ed G Goldberg. Blackwell Science, Oxford, 2003: 240-269.

Mackerras D, Margetts BM. Nutritional epidemiology. In: Handbook of Epidemiology. Eds. W Ahrens, I Pigeot. Springer-Verlag, Berlin. 2005: 999-1042.

Margetts BM . Impact of nutritional epidemiology. In: Nutritional Health: Strategies for disease prevention, second edition. Eds. NJ temple, T Wilson , DR Jacobs. Human Press, Totowa, NJ. 2006:1-23.

Margetts B. Overview. In: Public Health Nutrition. eds M Lawrence, T Worsley. Allen & Unwin, Crows Nest, NSW, 2007: 149-152.

Editorships

Editor in chief; Public Health Nutrition 1997-2006; deputy editor 2007-2010

Malaysian Journal of Nutrition

African Journal Food Agriculture Nutrition and Development