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Harsha Thirumurthy
Harsha Thirumurthy is an Professor in the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania. He is also Associate Director at the Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics and a Research Associate at Penn’s Population Studies Center. Professor Thirumurthy’s interests lie at the intersection of economics and public health. A major goal of his research is to use insights from economics and psychology to design and evaluate interventions that can improve health outcomes in low-income settings. His research has also studied the economic impacts of large-scale health initiatives.
Dr. Thirumurthy has led numerous randomized trials of behavioral interventions, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. He has published peer-reviewed articles in leading journals in economics, public health, and medicine, including JAMA, The Lancet HIV, PLOS Medicine, the New England Journal of Medicine, the Journal of Public Economics, and the American Economic Journal-Applied Economics. Dr. Thirumurthy completed a Ph.D. in economics at Yale University. He is an Affiliate of the Bureau for Research on the Economic Analysis of Development and Chair of the Population Sciences review panel at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
Selected Publications
“Behaviour change in the era of biomedical advances.” Nature Human Behaviour 7 (2023): 1417–1419.
Maintaining a healthy diet, being physically active, avoiding tobacco and alcohol abuse, getting adequate sleep and, where necessary, taking appropriate medications have long been first-line recommendations to prevent and treat cardiometabolic conditions — the leading causes of death and disability worldwide. But despite randomized controlled trials that demonstrate the efficacy of lifestyle modification interventions to reduce hypertension (for example, the ‘dietary approaches to stop hypertension’ diet), diabetes (for example, the diabetes prevention programme), high cholesterol (for example, the Mediterranean diet) and their associated burdens, we have had limited success in encouraging individuals to practice and sustain these healthy behaviours at the population level. The numbers of people who are affected by obesity, diabetes and hypertension have more than tripled worldwide in the past four decades. In addition, behavioural strategies (for example, structured counselling programmes) used to promote the uptake of lifestyle interventions have had small or short-term effects1. As a result, a question that arises is whether we should still look to behaviour change interventions and strategies to help us to prevent and manage cardiometabolic diseases.
(2023). “Behaviour change in the era of biomedical advances.” Nature Human Behaviour 7 (2023): 1417–1419.
New medications that target biological mechanisms to address obesity, diabetes and related cardiometabolic conditions are widely popular. As not everyone is eligible, willing or able to take medications, structural and behavioural solutions remain essential to treat and decrease the risk of cardiometabolic diseases.
HIV testing coverage in sub-Saharan Africa is lower among men than women. We investigated the impact of a peer-delivered U = U (undetectable equals untransmittable) message on men’s HIV testing uptake through a cluster randomized trial with individual mobile clinic days as a unit of randomisation.
On standard of care (SOC) days, peer promoters informed men about the availability of HIV testing at the mobile clinic. On intervention days, peer promoters delivered U = U messages. We used logistic regression adjusting for mobile clinic location, clustering by study day, to determine the percentage of invited men who tested for HIV at the mobile clinic.
Peer promoters delivered 1048 invitations over 12 days. In the SOC group, 68 (13%) of 544 men invited tested for HIV (3, 4.4% HIV-positive). In the U = U group, 112 (22%) of 504 men invited tested for HIV (7, 6.3% HIV-positive). Men in the U = U group had greater odds of testing for HIV (adjusted odds ratio = 1.89, 95% CI 1.21-2.95; p = 0.01).
Tailored, peer-delivered messages that explain the benefits of HIV treatment in reducing HIV transmission can increase men’s HIV testing uptake.