Rate My Professor Lucas Hertzog

Dr. Lucas Hertzog serves as a Research Fellow in the Curtin School of Population Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, at Curtin University in Perth, Australia. A sociologist by training, he obtained his PhD in Sociology from the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul in 2019. His doctoral thesis, titled "Dá um like, se inscreve no canal e compartilha o vídeo: Um estudo sociológico sobre o trabalho e as novas tecnologias digitais no YouTube Brasil," investigated the sociology of work and new digital technologies on YouTube Brazil. Hertzog maintains a research, teaching, and advocacy portfolio centered on climate change and health, sustainable development, vulnerable populations, quantitative sociology, social protection, and public health. His investigations span adolescent well-being in sub-Saharan Africa, addressing HIV prevention, gender-based violence, early pregnancy, child marriage, and multi-sectoral interventions aligned with sustainable development goals, as well as environmental health risks in Australia including extreme air pollution, heat anomalies, and drought impacts.

Hertzog has authored numerous impactful publications demonstrating the health consequences of climate change and effective protective strategies. He led research estimating the mortality burden from exceptional PM_2.5 air pollution events in Australian cities, published in Heliyon (2024). His study on suicide deaths linked to climate-induced heat anomalies in Australia appeared in BMJ Mental Health (2024). Other key works include a systematic review and meta-analysis of interventions to prevent post-tuberculosis sequelae in eClinicalMedicine (2024), social protection as a strategy for HIV prevention, education promotion, and child marriage reduction among adolescents in Lesotho (2024), extreme drought and sexual violence against adolescent girls and young women across multiple countries in PLOS Global Public Health (2025), multidimensional poverty by HIV status in Eastern and Southern Africa (2026), and the role of public health interventions in modifying prenatal exposures to air pollution and heat with child health outcomes (2026). Earlier contributions encompass multiple impacts of Ethiopia's health extension program on adolescent health (Journal of Adolescent Health, 2022), accelerating sustainable development goals for adolescents in Ghana (Psychology, Health & Medicine, 2022), and associations of SDG accelerators with adolescent well-being in Zambia (International Journal of Public Health, 2022). As part of Curtin's WHO Collaborating Centre for Climate Change and Health Impact, his findings highlight growing urban threats from pollution and inform policy on adolescent protection and climate adaptation.