Professor Joseph Wu specialises in the mathematical and statistical modelling of diseases. His research focuses on developing analytics and strategies for disease control and prevention, with a particular emphasis on vaccine hesitancy and epidemic nowcasting/forecasting. He has extensive experience working with various diseases, including COVID-19, influenza, HPV, MERS, yellow fever, and various types of cancer.

Professor Wu is the managing director of the Laboratory of Data Discovery for Health (D24H). His research programme in D24H aims to develop AI technology and tools for global and personal health protection.

He is the director of HKU's first Massive Open Online Courseware (MOOC) Epidemics which has had more than 50,000 people enrolled since its first launch in 2014.

He is co-editor-in-chief of Epidemics and an associate editor of PLOS Computational Biology and PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases. He is a member of the WHO Advisory Committee on Immunisation and Vaccines-related Implementation Research (IVIR-AC). He is a member of the MIT SOLVE Challenge Leadership Group and an SME advisor to the MIT HK Innovation Node. He is a Fellow of the UK Faculty of Public Health.