Stephen Molldrem is Assistant Professor and Research Program Director in Bioethics and Health Humanities at The University of Texas Medical Branch. He is an ethnographer, qualitative social research, and health policy scholar situated mainly in Science and Technology Studies (STS). He also works across public health ethics, data studies, queer studies, and global health. His collaborative and interdisciplinary work has been funded by numerous agencies, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and National Science Foundation (NSF).
For nearly a decade, Stephen has studied how the ongoing incorporation of digital infrastructures and pathogen genomics into public health programs is reconfiguring the politics and practice of infectious disease control. His research on pathogen genomics in the US, Botswana, and global health policy have addressed numerous ethical, legal, and social implications (ELSI) stemming from uses of these technologies in HIV, TB, and SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 programs. His papers have shown how uses of pathogen genomics in disease control programs have played key roles in reshaping relations between scientific institutions, public health agencies, and social movements led by people living with and affected by infectious diseases. This work includes studies of how pathogen genomics have impacted framings of infectious disease evolution and transmission among experts and lay publics – including journalists, activists, and affected groups. He has also documented how pathogen genomics have changed the politics of consent in US HIV programs, leading social movement actors to ask for reforms. His work has also brought insights from queer studies to analyses of public health, showing how US HIV programs that use digital and genomic technologies have shifted how public health institutions govern sexuality in relation to transmission risk.
Stephen maintains active projects in other areas. These include studies on the ethics and practice of translational science, on the history of sexuality in relation to HIV/AIDS, and on the changing place of consent in public health programs for the digital era. He has published widely in leading journals, including The American Journal of Bioethics, Social Studies of Science, Health Policy, BioSocieties, Global Public Health, The Milbank Quarterly, and others.
Affiliations
- UTMB School of Public and Population Health
- UTMB Institute for Bioethics and Health Humanities
- UTMB Institute for Translational Sciences