Professor McLaws is an epidemiologist specialising in hospital infection and infectious disease control. She is a member of the WHO Health Emergencies Programme Experts Advisory Panel for Infection Prevention and Control Preparedness. She was also a WHO Advisor to China and Malaysia during the development of their health surveillance systems, and the “Clean Care is Safer Care Challenge” program. She was commissioned by the Commonwealth to review the “Pandemic Influenza Infection Control Guidelines”. She has also collaborated with Beijing in reviewing responses to the SARS outbreak with respect to hospital and healthcare worker safety. She is a member of the New South Wales Covid-19 Infection Prevention and Control Specialty Taskforce. Her current research includes developing wastewater epidemiology as a rapid surveillance system for antibiotic use and resistance in a range of human pathogens. She also mentors Ph.D. candidates and performs infection control research in mixed- and low-middle income countries including Cambodia, China, Mali, Indonesia, Indonesia, Iran, Vietnam and Turkey.