[Hiring] Senior Malaria Advisor @ICF

Role Description

The Senior Malaria Advisor sits within ICF’s Global Health and Development Practice, which serves clients such as the U.S. Department of Labor, U.S. Department of State, philanthropic funders, multilateral organizations, and national governments to strengthen health systems, generate evidence, and improve population health and development outcomes in low- and middle-income countries. The practice has deep expertise in population-based surveys, health data systems, monitoring and evaluation, and technical assistance to national institutions.

ICF seeks a Senior Malaria Advisor to provide specialized, intermittent technical guidance to The Demographic and Health Surveys Program on malaria-related data needs and the survey adaptations required to meet them. Working on an on-call basis, the Advisor leads the exploration and strategic incorporation of innovations in malaria data collection—spanning questionnaire content, biomarker technologies, sampling strategies, analytic approaches, and beyond—across Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) and Malaria Indicator Surveys (MIS).

The Advisor serves as a senior source of malaria-specific expertise, helping the program keep pace with a rapidly evolving malaria landscape—rollout of new malaria vaccines, shifting seasonality and geography, and diagnostic advances—while weighing operational, ethical, and budgetary factors. The Advisor works closely with the program’s samplers, biomarker specialists, methodologists, and analysts, and represents the program in relevant technical working groups. This on-call, part-time position is based on project needs and is 100% remote/telecommute, with international travel to study countries.

What You'll Be Doing

• Provide technical guidance on malaria-related data needs and the requisite survey adaptations across DHS and MIS surveys.
• Lead the exploration and strategic incorporation of malaria-related data collection innovations, including:
  • Questionnaire refinements (e.g., to capture malaria immunization)
  • Biomarker technologies (e.g., new diagnostics)
  • Sampling strategies (e.g., approaches to reach school-age children)
  • Analytic requirements (e.g., accounting for changes in malaria seasonality and geography)
• Work closely with other subject-matter experts — samplers, biomarker specialists, methodologists, and analysts — to weigh the potential of proposed adaptations and advances against operational, ethical, and budgetary factors.
• Convene experts and participate in existing technical working groups to examine and propose potential solutions and to bring new learning back to the program.
• Support malaria data collection in DHS and MIS surveys, largely in Africa, from design through implementation and analysis.
• Advise on alignment with global malaria measurement guidance and partner priorities (e.g., WHO, the U.S. President’s Malaria Initiative, and national malaria control programs), as needed.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree (or higher) in epidemiology, public health, parasitology or infectious disease, demography, biostatistics, or a related quantitative or biomedical field.
• Minimum 15 years of relevant experience in malaria or infectious-disease measurement and population health, including substantial experience with population-based household surveys.
• Demonstrated, hands-on experience with The DHS Program and with Malaria Indicator Surveys (MIS), including working familiarity with their questionnaires, biomarker protocols, sampling approaches, and standard indicators.
• Deep subject-matter expertise in malaria epidemiology and malaria data collection, including RDT- and/or microscopy-based parasitemia measurement and related biomarker methods.
• Demonstrated experience supporting malaria survey work in Africa.
• Track record of translating technical and methodological innovation into practical, implementable survey guidance, and of working effectively across multidisciplinary teams and with in-country institutions.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with emerging malaria data collection innovations, such as new biomarker technologies, questionnaire adaptations to capture malaria vaccination, or sampling approaches to reach school-age children.
• Familiarity with the analytic implications of changing malaria seasonality and geography for survey design, timing, and estimation.
• Experience convening or actively participating in malaria technical working groups.
• Working proficiency in French.

Professional Skills You Will Use

• Exceptional verbal and written communication, including the ability to convey technical and methodological concepts to varied audiences — funders, country partners, and technical teams.
• Able to make sound technical decisions under real-world timing and budget constraints, including protecting scientific integrity when tradeoffs arise.
• Attention to detail, organized, and proactive; able to manage competing priorities on an intermittent, as-needed basis.
• Comfortable working across time zones and cultures with international partners.

Pay Range

The pay range for this position based on full-time employment is: $89,649.00 - $152,404.00.