We are delighted to welcome Vaia (Yioula) Sigounas as the new co-chair of the Anthropological Responses to Health Emergencies (ARHE) SIG. Yioula brings deep experience and insight into the social, cultural, and ethical dimensions of health emergencies, and we are excited to have her leadership and perspective join the group. Yioula will be joining Lauren Carruth as co-chairs of ARHE as of February 2026. Please read a bit more about Yioula’s work below.
Vaia (Yioula) Sigounas is a sociocultural medical anthropologist working at the intersection of local and global health inequities, humanitarian aid, and medical technology. Her work focuses on sub-Saharan Africa and the United States. She completed her Ph.D. in medical anthropology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and her postdoctoral fellowship in cardiovascular disease epidemiology at the Gillings School of Global Public Health. Prior to this, she earned an A.B. magna cum laude in literature from Harvard University, an M.D. from UNC-Chapel Hill, and trained as a general surgeon.
Dr. Sigounas’ work has been funded by grants from the National Science Foundation in Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies and a T32 award from the NIH. She has published articles in academic journals, including Medical Anthropology Quarterly and Infection and Immunity, and is currently working on her first book about how medical technologies built in the Global North travel to the Global South and serve as vectors for the ideals, judgments, and goals that their societies of origin have toward persons with disabilities. At CWRU she teaches Introduction to Medical Anthropology, Bodies Technologies Societies, and Humanitarianism and Humanitarian Aid.