RED DOOR - Key Persons
Mackay is a doctoral candidate at the University of Auckland with a keen interest in the use of wastewater-based epidemiology. Mackay's background is in geography and environmental science where in his BSc (Honours) he explored the ethical dimensions of applied wastewater-based epidemiology, and how these ethical issues can vary across different spatial scales. Continuing the theme of scale, Mackay's Master's thesis explored the spatial, temporal and community-scale sociodemographic dimensions of illicit and licit drug consumption in wastewater treatment plants from across New Zealand. Mackay's current research is focussing on refining the methodologies underpinning WBE, particularly how to estimate the number of people connected to wastewater-treatment plants. Underlying all this work is an interest into how wastewater data can be combined with complementary datasets to improve insights into public health.
Sam has a PhD in urban water management and has worked as a hydrologist for the private and government sector. He returned to academia in 2009 and currently works for the University of Auckland. He is a bit of a generalist working across Water Sensitive Cities, water-infrastructure, wastewater analysis and surveillance.