Dr Ciara Staunton is a Senior Researcher at the Institute for Biomedicine, Eurac Research (Italy), a Consultant to the WHO on WHO guiding principles for human genome data sharing, and an Honorary Research Associate at the School of Law, University of KwaZulu-Natal. In addition, she is a member of many international advisory boards providing ethical and legal oversight on projects ranging from data science, AI, genomics, to biobanking and a member of the National Irish COVID-19 Biobank – Research Ethics Committee (NICB-REC). Previously Ciara has held consultancies for public health organisations such as the Global Fund, the South African National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD), the Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics (FIND), and the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator.
Ciara’s research focuses on the governance of new and emerging technologies, in particular stem cell research, genomic research and biobanking, and the use of health data in research. She has published widely on these topics and has been in receipt of grants from the Welcome Trust, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Irish Research Council. Ciara’s research led to her being involved in the development of policy in Ireland, Bahrain and Africa.
From 2010-2013 she was a post-doctorate researcher at the Centre for Medical Ethics and Law, Stellenbosch University. During this time, she co-ordinated the Advancing Research Ethics in Southern Africa (ARESA) Program and was a member of the H3Africa Ethics and Regulatory Issues Working Group. She obtained her PhD from NUI, Galway for her thesis The Regulation of Stem Cell Research in Ireland.
Prior to starting her academic career, Ciara was a Legal Researcher at the Law Reform Commission of Ireland.
