Secretary-General Announces Appointment of Co-Chairs, Membership of His Global Health Crises Task Force
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today announced the membership of his Global Health Crises Task Force.
The Global Health Crises Task Force was established by the Secretary-General to support and monitor implementation of recommendations developed by his High-level Panel on the Global Response to Health Crises. The Panel issued its report, “Protecting humanity from future health crises”, on 9 February 2016, following which the Secretary-General released his observations on the Panel’s recommendations in his report, “Strengthening the global health architecture”, on 8 April. In its work, the Task Force will ensure that implementation of the Panel’s recommendations is aligned with the observations of the Secretary-General.
The Task Force will produce regular updates for the Secretary-General, describing progress on implementation of the Panel’s recommendations. It will also bring to his attention issues relating to emerging health crises and to gaps or weaknesses in the global health architecture.
The Task Force will be co-led by Jan Eliasson, Deputy Secretary-General, Jim Yong Kim, President of the World Bank Group, and Margaret Chan, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO). The Deputy Secretary-General will also serve as Chair of the Task Force. David Nabarro, the Secretary-General’s Special Adviser on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and Climate Change, will support the Task Force Chair.
The membership of the Task Force is drawn from across the United Nations system and also includes external experts. These are distinguished individuals with backgrounds in infectious diseases, community health care, public health and development. They also have experience in risk assessment, implementation of humanitarian action, management of outbreak responses, financing, research and innovation.
The Task Force will exercise its functions for one year, starting in July 2016.
The list of the Task Force co-leads and members, together with the biographies of members external to the United Nations system, is set out below.
Task Force Members
Co-leads
Jan Eliasson (Sweden, Chair) is the Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations.
Jim Yong Kim (United States) is the President of the World Bank Group.
Dr Margaret Chan (China) is the Director-General of the World Health Organization.
Members
Helen Clark (New Zealand) is the Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
Chris Elias (United States) is the President of the Global Development Program at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Focusing on areas with the potential for high-impact, sustainable solutions that can reach hundreds of millions of people, he oversees Global Development’s portfolio in Agriculture Development; Emergency Response; Family Planning; Financial Services for the Poor; Maternal, Newborn and Child Health; Nutrition; Polio Eradication; Vaccine Delivery; and Water, Sanitation and Hygiene. Before joining the Gates Foundation in February 2012, he worked in various positions and countries for international non-profit organizations, most recently serving as president and CEO of PATH, an international, non-profit organization dedicated to improving the health of people around the world by advancing technologies, strengthening systems, and encouraging healthy behaviours.
Anthony S. Fauci (United States) is the Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health. Since his appointment in 1984, Dr. Fauci has overseen an extensive research portfolio devoted to preventing, diagnosing and treating infectious and immune-mediated diseases. He is also Chief of the NIAID Laboratory of Immunoregulation, where he has made numerous important discoveries related to HIV/AIDS, and is one of the most-cited scientists in that field. Dr. Fauci serves as one of the key advisers to the White House and Department of Health and Human Services on global AIDS issues, and on initiatives to bolster medical and public health preparedness against emerging infectious disease threats such as Ebola and pandemic influenza. He was one of the principal architects of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which has already been responsible for saving millions of lives throughout the developing world.
Mohamed-Mahmoud Hacen (Mauritania) is the President of the Mauritanian Public Health Association. During the recent Ebola outbreak, he coordinated the contribution of the Islamic Development Bank to the epidemic control and post-Ebola recovery from 2015-2016. Dr. Hacen began his career at his country’s Ministry of Health, and as National Director of Health Services, he was in charge of oversight on epidemic preparedness and response. He subsequently worked with the World Health Organization as an adviser for disease prevention and control in West Africa and as the WHO representative in Benin, Congo, Burundi, Madagascar and Burkina Faso. Following his retirement in 2006, he was appointed by the WHO to coordinate the response to the H1N1 Influenza Pandemic from 2009-2010. As a member of a technical working group appointed by the WHO, he also contributed to the revitalization of the Global Task Force on Cholera Control from 2013-2014.
Felicity Harvey (United Kingdom) is the Director General for Public and International Health and will retire at the end of June 2016. Since her appointment in April 2012, she has been responsible for global and public health, including the public health system; communicable and non-communicable diseases; and emergency preparedness, resilience and response, including coordinating the Ebola response across National Health Service England (NHS) and Public Health England. She was previously Director of the Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit; Head of Medicines, Pharmacy and Industry Group at the Department of Health; Director of Prison Health and member of HM Prison Service Board at HM Prison Service; Head of Quality Management, NHS Executive; and Private Secretary to the Chief Medical Officer. Dr. Harvey is a member of the Independent Oversight and Advisory Committee of the WHO Health Emergencies Programme.
Ilona Kickbusch (Germany) is the Director of the Global Health Centre at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva. She was a member of the WHO’s independent Ebola interim assessment panel. Ms. Kickbusch has recently been awarded the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesverdienstkreuz) in recognition of her invaluable contributions to innovation in governance for global health and global health diplomacy. She is a senior adviser to the Regional Directors of the WHO Regional Offices for Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean, and has advised many countries on their global health strategies. In Switzerland, she serves on the executive board of the Careum Foundation and on the expert panel advising the Federal Councillor responsible for health. She has contributed to innovation in health in many ways throughout her career and has a strong commitment to the empowerment of women. Ms. Kickbusch has worked with the WHO at various levels and in academia as a professor at Yale University.
Anthony Lake (United States) is the Executive Director of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
Yves Lévy (France) is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research. His research activity is directed at understanding the development of the immune system and its pathology. He has coordinated and developed some 20 national and international clinical trials of immunotherapies and vaccines for HIV infection, certain immunodeficiencies and infectious diseases. From 1996 to date, Mr. Lévy has directed the Department of Clinical Immunology and Infectious Diseases at Henri Mondor de Créteil Hospital. In 2006, he became Scientific Director of the vaccine programme at the French National Agency for Research on AIDS and Viral Hepatitis (ANRS). In 2011, he created the “Vaccine Research Institute” labex (laboratory of excellence). From 2010 to 2012, he was Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Paris-Est Créteil University (UPEC). He subsequently became a special adviser to the Minister for Higher Education and Research.
Poh Lian Lim (Singapore) is a senior consultant in her country’s Ministry of Health, and at Tan Tock Seng Hospital. She holds joint academic appointments at the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine and the National University of Singapore School of Public Health and School of Medicine. She also chairs national committees on anti-microbial resistance control, and specialist training in infectious disease. Ms. Lim heads the Travellers’ Health and Vaccination Clinic, and is the Site Director for GeoSentinel in Singapore. She has been actively involved with the Steering Committee of the WHO Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN), and the Advisory Group on the Reform of WHO Work’s in Health Emergencies. She has worked on various outbreaks at the national and international levels, including SARS, dengue, chikungunya, H1N1 influenza, and leptospirosis. Ms. Lim was Head of Department at the Tan Tock Seng Hospital’s Institute of Infectious Diseases and Epidemiology from 2012 to 2016.
Stephen O’Brien (United Kingdom) is the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator.
Shigeru Omi (Japan) is the President of the Japan Community Health Care Organization. Since 2013, he has served as a member of the World Health Organization Executive Board. He was the President of the sixty-sixth World Health Assembly in 2013. Dr. Omi served for 10 years as the WHO Regional Director for the Western Pacific from 1999 to 2009, and spearheaded the fight against the SARS outbreak in 2003. He was also the Director of the Division of Communicable Disease Prevention and Control in the WHO Regional Office for the Western Pacific from 1990 to 1998, and led the Regional Polio Eradication Initiative. From 2009 to 2012, Dr. Omi taught public health at the Jichi Medical School in Japan, where he had worked as a researcher in the Division of Immunology from 1987 to 1989.
Elhadj As Sy (Senegal) is the Secretary General of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). Before joining the IFRC in August 2014, he was UNICEF’s Director of Partnerships and Resource Development in New York. He has also served as UNICEF Regional Director for Eastern and Southern Africa and as Global Emergency Coordinator for the Horn of Africa. From 2005 to 2008, Mr. Sy was the Director of the HIV/AIDS Practice with the UNDP in New York. Before that, he worked with the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria in Geneva. He has also held the position of UNAIDS Representative in New York and Director of the New York Liaison Office. From 1988 to 1997, he was the Director of Health and Development Programmes with Environment and Development Action in the Third World, based in Dakar, Senegal. Mr. Sy is a member of the Independent Oversight and Advisory Committee for the WHO Health Emergencies Programme.