Health Economics

Edina Sinanovic, Professor and Head of Division

Email:  Edina Sinanovic

Phone: 021 406 6575

Publications

Edina Sinanovic is Professor of Health Economics at the University of Cape Town, where she serves as Head of the Health Economics Division and Director of the Health Economics Unit in the School of Public Health. With a background in economics and health economics, she holds a PhD in Health Economics from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Over the last 28 years, her research had focused primarily on economic evaluation of alternative preventative, diagnostic and treatment healthcare interventions, especially in relation to TB, cancer and STIs, and economic considerations in vaccination, with an emphasis on the economic modelling of new vaccines.

Edina teaches Economic Evaluation for Universal Health Coverage across postgraduate programmes, and supervises PhD and Master’s students studying topics including the distributional cost-effectiveness of publicly funded interventions for early detection and treatment of breast cancer, the cost-effectiveness of leukemia treatment strategies, and the economic impact of a preventive intervention for paediatric MDR-TB on the health system and households.

She is a member of the Executive Committee of the Pharmaceutical & Technology Clinical Management Association of South Africa, with a focus on research and education. She is also a member of the TB Vaccine Epidemiology, Modelling and Trial Designs working group.
She has served on the WHO Immunization and Vaccines Implementation Research Advisory Committee, and on the Strategic Scientific Advisory Board of the Botnar Research Centre for Child Health, University of Basel, dedicated to advancing global child and adolescent health.

Edina is committed to applying economic analysis as a formal research tool to identify and evaluate interventions that are cost-effective, have a potential to improve health, access to care and quality of life.  

Susan Cleary, Professor and Head of School

Email:  Susan Cleary Publications

Susan Cleary is Professor of Health Economics and Head of Department and Director: School of Public Health at the University of Cape Town. She joined the Health Economics Unit in 2001. With a background in economics, she holds a PhD in Health Economics from the University of Cape Town.

Her research focuses on the economic evaluation of health care interventions, health financing and priority setting for universal health coverage. She has key strengths in the broad methodologies of economic evaluation including health economic modelling.

Susan teaches economic evaluation and health financing at the Diploma, Masters and PhD levels. Her PhD students have conducted empirical economic evaluations across key health care interventions (e.g. Covid vaccines, psychological treatments for depression) in addition to working towards clarifying key health economic concepts (e.g. the meaning of ‘affordability’ in health system decision-making).

Throughout her career she has been driven by questions of how to enable health equity in South Africa and similar settings.

Olufunke Alaba, Associate Professor

Email:  Olufunke Alaba

Phone:  021 406 6576

Publications

Olufunke Alaba is an Associate Professor of Health Economics in the Health Economics Unit at the School of Public Health, University of Cape Town, where she joined in 2009. She holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Ibadan.

Her research focuses on health financing reforms, equity in health, priority setting for UHC, and the social determinants of health. She leads and collaborates on a wide range of projects across South Africa and other LMICs, including work on informal savings groups (ROSCAs/Stokvels), food security and nutrition, physical activity environments, obesity and NCDs, climate–health interactions, maternal mental health, vaccine costing, gender-based violence costing, and risk-adjusted capitation models. Through this work, she contributes to strengthening evidence-based policymaking, reducing health inequities, and advancing universal health coverage across Africa.

In teaching and supervision, Olufunke teaches Economics of Health Systems, at Master’s level and supervises postgraduate students working on health financing, equity analysis, physical activity, and food systems research. She is deeply committed to capacity building in health economics and mentors emerging scholars across South Africa and the broader African region, including through iHEA and AfHEA mentorship committees.

Outside of academic work, Olufunke serves on several editorial boards, advisory committees, and international research networks, including the International Sustainable Development Research Society (ISDRS) as Director of Production for the new Sustainability & Beyond journal. She actively engages with government departments, NGOs, WHO, UNICEF, British Academy, and the African Union to translate research into practice and inform policy reforms.

Her professional motivation is to strengthen equitable, resilient, and people-centred health systems across Africa by generating rigorous evidence that supports fair financing, healthy environments, and improved population wellbeing.

Lucy Cunnama, Senior Lecturer

Email:  Lucy Cunnama

Phone:  021 406 6754

Publications

Lucy Cunnama is a Senior Lecturer in Health Economics in the School of Public Health at the University of Cape Town and joined the Health Economics Unit in 2012. With a background in physiotherapy and public health, she holds a Master of Public Health degree with a specialization in Health Economics from the University of Cape Town.

Her research focuses on economic evaluation and access to health care in the South African context, including work on tuberculosis diagnostics and treatment, paediatric pneumonia, and models of care related to the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV. Through this work, she contributes to strengthening evidence-based decision-making and improving equity in health outcomes within the South African health system.

In teaching and supervision, Lucy Cunnama teaches health economics across postgraduate programmes, including co-convening and teaching on the MPH Health Economics track and leading a module for the online Postgraduate Diploma in Health Economics. She supervises PhD and Master’s students and demonstrates a strong commitment to capacity-building in health economics and the mentoring of emerging public health professionals. Outside of academic work, Lucy Cunnama serves on the Departmental Research Committee for the School of Public Health and Family Medicine and is a Health Economist on the South African Department of Health’s National TB Think Tank. Her professional motivation is grounded in improving access to effective and affordable health care interventions and supporting policy-relevant research to strengthen health systems in resource-constrained settings.

Senzo Mthembu, Lecturer

Email: Senzo Mthembu

Senzo Mthembu is a Lecturer in Health Economics and the Track Convenor for the Master of Public Health (Health Economics) programme in the School of Public Health at the University of Cape Town. He joined the Health Economics Unit in 2024. He is completing a PhD in Health Economics at University College London, with a focus on non-communicable diseases and nutrition. He also holds an MSc in Political Science and Political Economy from the London School of Economics and a Master of Commerce in Economic Science from the University of Cape Town.

His research focuses on the intersection of health systems, fiscal policy, and population health. His work explores NCD prevention, nutrition, health financing reforms, and the application of economic evidence to guide public policy. He has contributed to projects on excise tax policy, food environments, tobacco and alcohol control, digital health system strengthening, and perioperative care costing. He has worked across South Africa, the United Kingdom, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and Eswatini, collaborating with governments, research institutions, and multilateral partners to support evidence-informed decision-making.

In teaching and supervision, Senzo lectures in the Postgraduate Diploma in Health Economics and the MPH Health Economics programmes, covering topics such as economic evaluation, equity and efficiency in health systems, economics of health systems, strategic purchasing, and the design of stated-preference studies. He supervises postgraduate students engaged in applied health economics research relevant to low- and middle-income country contexts. He is dedicated to capacity building and mentorship for emerging scholars and practitioners.

Beyond academia, he collaborates with organisations such as the World Bank, the World Health Organisation, government entities, and regional health policy networks to enhance applied research and evidence translation. His professional motivation is to promote equitable health financing and strengthen African-led research to improve health outcomes and policy responsiveness.

Buhle Ndweni, Lecturer

Email:  Buhle Ndweni

Buhle Ndweni is a Lecturer in Health Economics in the School of Public Health, University of Cape Town (UCT). Before venturing into health economics, she worked in financial journalism and the investments industry — experience that blends analytical rigour with data-driven storytelling to communicate complex evidence effectively to decision-makers. She holds an MSc in Health Economics and Decision Modelling from the University of Sheffield, UK, which was fully funded by the prestigious Chevening Scholarship. She obtained her Postgraduate Diploma in Health Economics from UCT, BA Honours in Journalism and Media Studies from the University of the Witwatersrand, and BSc in Microbial Biotechnology from Stellenbosch University.

Buhle lectures on decision modelling, priority setting and HTA at postgraduate level. She also delivers guest lectures to 3rd year and 4th year medical students on health economics. She supervises postgraduate students conducting economic evaluations that inform health policy.

Her research is primarily on the economic evaluation of infectious disease diagnostics and interventions, which is also the focus of her doctoral research. Buhle received advanced HTA training for her PhD at the University of York, UK, as an awardee of the NIHR Short Placement Award for Research Collaboration (SPARC) grant. She is also involved in research projects that use health economics to promote equitable access to healthcare in underserved communities. 

Buhle serves on the board of ISPOR South Africa, a forum for health economics and outcomes research focused on healthcare policies and decisions in Africa. She is on a mission to develop an ISPOR SA Student Chapter that is run by the students for the students. 

Beyond UCT, she is co-founder and co-chair of the R-HTA in LMICs Chapter, a subsidiary of the R for HTA Consortium in the UK, which trains health analysts in low- and middle-income countries to use R software for data analysis and building HTA models. She supports the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) on research related to South Africa's first health-related quality of life valuation study, in collaboration with the George Institute for Global Health in Australia. She is a member of the Clinical Advisory Committee on the Prescribed Minimum Benefits guideline development for the Council for Medical Schemes.