I am an interdisciplinary environmental health scientist and have always worked across disciplinary boundaries. I have degrees from the University of Cambridge (English Literature BA,MACantab); the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM)/London School of Economics (LSE) (MSc); and the University of London (PhD in Environmental Epidemiology). I started work in a leprosy colony in Tamil Nadu, India when I was 18. After a degree in Cambridge University, I returned to work in a Tibetan Monastery in Himachal Pradesh, India. I then worked for WWF in Sapo National Park in Liberia, and for the UK government (DFID) on multisectoral slum improvement in India.  I came to a more conventional academic career after joining LSHTM in 1991. 

Until 2012 I was full-time Reader of Ecology and Global Health at the LSHTM. I continue to work at LSHTM as a Visiting Professor teaching specialist modules on both the in-house and distance learning MSc programme. 

I am now Full Professor of Environmental Ethics in the University of Primorska in Slovenia.  I am also Professor (Hon) in the UCL Bartlett Development Planning Unit of the Faculty of the Built Environment, working with architects and planners who are interested in understanding how their professions affect human health. I was formerly (2012-2017) Professor (Hon) of Equity and Global Health in the UCL Institute of Health Equity, and have also been Visiting Full Professor in the National University of Tucumán in Argentina (1999-2001 and 2009 -2017), and the Federal University of Parana in Brazil (2002-2005). 

I am Fellow (by distinction) of the Faculty of Public Health Medicine of the Royal College of Physicians, and International Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine.

I am winner of the Royal Society Kohn Award for Excellence in Engagement of the Public in Science, and the Mayor of London Academic Excellence Award in Public Engagement.