Credentials

Dr. Sally Lahm is a wildlife ecologist and biological anthropologist with experience in scientific research, diverse consultancies, and biodiversity surveys in African countries since 1982. Her research includes the natural history and socio-cultural dimensions of the Ebola virus in Gabon and Guinea, respectively. Her early work in care and management of birds and mammals in zoological parks in the United States inspired her to study the ecology of the mandrill in Gabon for her master’s degree at San Diego State University, after which she studied human/wildlife interaction and impacts on wildlife populations in northeastern Gabon for her doctorate at New York University. Both studies were based at the Institute of Research in Tropical Ecology, where she was a resident Associate Research Scientist of the Ministry of Higher Learning and Research until 2005. Her specific wildlife interests are ungulates and elephants.

Sally has collaborated with government ministries in several countries, and with organizations and institutions such as the Smithsonian Institution, the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, the World Health Organization, Conservation International, World Wildlife Fund and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS). For WCS, she was a technical advisor to the Gabon National Parks Program from 2000-= to 2005. She has also worked in Ghana, Guinea, Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Cote d’Ivoire, Madagascar, and Uganda in various projects, including working with the mining and petroleum industries to improve their environmental and wildlife mitigation, management, and monitoring plans and implementation.

Sally retired as Research Associate Professor in the Department of Global & Community Health at George Mason University (GMU) in Fairfax, Virginia in September 2023, and is currently a Faculty Affiliate of the Department of Environmental Science & Policy at GMU. She also holds a continuing associate faculty appointment as Assistant Professor of Research in the Department of Epidemiology and Environmental Health at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

She is a continuing member of both the Africa Section and Great Ape Section of the IUCN Primate Specialist Group, a member of the IUCN Antelope Specialist Group, and is an advisor to the Agence Nationale des Parcs Nationaux (National Agency for National Parks) of Gabon.