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Evaluation
Team
-
Afghanistan: Micheal Toole of the Burnet Institute in
Australia
-
India: Peter
Wright of
Dartmouth
Medical
School
in the
United States of America
-
Nigeria: Mohamed Ali Jaffer of the Ministry of
Health
,
Oman
-
Pakistan: Viroj
Tangcharoensathien of the Ministry of Public Health in
Thailand
-
International spread:
- Andy Hall of the
London
School
of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in the
United Kingdom
- Peter Ndumbe of the
University
of
Buea
in
Cameroon
The Team met in
Geneva
in early July to determine its workplan and discuss the composition of the
Sub-Teams. Selection of members was at the discretion of the Chairs with care taken to ensure the inclusion of individuals with expertise
in the primary challenges (such as
security
, social mobilization and cross-sect
or
al collaboration) identified in each of the remaining infected areas.
A senior-level
national representative with a strong public health background but independent
from polio eradication activities has been nominated by the Minister of Health
of each of the polio-endemic countries is supporting the Team.
See below for information on all team members.
Professor
Michael J. Toole
Chair of the Sub-Team for Afghanistan
Professor Toole has been the Head of the Centre for International Health at the Burnet
Institute in Melbourne, Australia since 1995 and is also a Professor in the
Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine at Melbourne's Monash
University. He has a medical degree from Monash University (Melbourne), a
Diploma in Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (London), and a Diploma in Advanced
Epidemiology & Biostatistics (New England Epidemiology Institute). He is a medical
epidemiologist and public health physician with special interests in
communicable disease control, including HIV prevention and care, nutrition,
refugee populations and humanitarian emergencies.
Between 1973 and
1982, Professor Toole worked in rural and refugee public health programmes in
Thailand and Somalia and was the health coordinator of Oxfam Australia between
1983 and 1986.
Between 1986 and
1994, he worked at the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
where he coordinated the agency's technical assistance to refugees and displaced
populations in Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Democratic Republic of the
Congo, Ethiopia, Iraq, Malawi, Pakistan, the Russian Federation, Somalia, the
Sudan, and Zimbabwe. His recent field work has focused on HIV prevention and
primary health care in the Lao People's Democratic Republic, Papua New Guinea,
China, and Myanmar. He is the technical director of the AusAID-funded National
HIV/AIDS Support Project in Papua New Guinea, a board member of Médécins sans
Frontières in Australia, a board member of the Three Diseases Fund for
Burma/Myanmar, and a member of the Technical Review Panel of the Global Fund to
fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
Members of Team:
Ms Stephanie Simmonds: Independent public health
management consultant, Bosnia and
Herzegovina
Dr Ben Coghlan:
Epidemiologist, Burnet Institute, Melbourne, Australia
Dr Najibullah Mojadidi: Government representative, Senior Advisor on Health & Education to the
President of
the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan
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Professor
Peter Wright
Chair of the Sub-Team for India
Professor
Wright has held the position of Professor of Pediatrics at the Dartmouth School
of Medicine in the United States of America since 2007. He is also closely
involved with GHESKIO - a Haitian non-governmental
organization dedicated to clinical service, research, and training in HIV/AIDS
and related diseases. From 1974-2007 he was a member of the faculty at
Vanderbilt University, leading the Division of Pediatric Infectious Disease.
During a sabbatical year, in 1987-1988, he worked at WHO, establishing a
research agenda for the Expanded Programme on Immunization.
Ongoing
activities include involvement in the Clinical Trials Unit of the United States
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and membership of the
Scientific Advisory Boards of the Trans-Caribbean HIV/AIDS Research Initiative
and the Center for HIV/AIDS Vaccine Immunology. He works closely with the
Merieux Fondation on the establishment of their global network on the impact and
etiology of acute respiratory illness.
Professor
Wright serves as a member and interim chair of WHO's Polio Research Committee.
He serves on the Taskforce for the Global Health Polio Antiviral Group tasked
with developing an effective polio antiviral therapy.
Professor
Wright received his medical degree from Harvard University and completed
research and clinical training at the National Institutes of Health and the
Children's Hospital, Boston respectively.
Members of Team:
Dr Marc LaForce:
Director of the Meningitis Vaccine Project (MVP), PATH, France
Dr Jon Rohde:
Former UNICEF Representative, India
Dr Nick Grassly:
Epidemiologist, Department of Infectious Disease, Epidemiology,
Imperial
College London
Dr John Modlin:
Chair, Department of Paediatrics, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center,
USA
Ms Nirupama Sarma: Consultant in
health communications and media, Bangalore, India
Dr Nirmala Murthy:
Consultant in health management, Bangalore, India
Dr Vishwa Katoch:
Government representative, Director-General of the Indian Council of
Medical Research
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Dr Mohamed Ali Jaffer
Overall Chair of the Evaluation Team; Chair of the Sub-Team for Nigeria
Dr Mohamed Ali Jaffer has held the position
of Advisor for Health Affairs to the Ministry of Health, Oman since 2006 and Director General
of Health Affairs, also in Oman, since 1993.
In addition to key responsibilities at the national level, he has held a
number of positions at global and regional level: Chair of the WHO Regional Certification Commission for Polio Eradication; a member of WHO's
Executive Board, Regional Consultative Committee for the Eastern Mediterranean
and Regional Commission for Polio Eradication for Europe; and a member of the
Executive Board of the Gulf Cooperation Council Ministers of Health.
Dr
Ali Jaffer graduated in Medicine from Baghdad University, Iraq, and obtained his
Masters degree from the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine in the United
Kingdom.
Members of Team:
Professor Ghazi Gjamjoom: Professor of Virology,
Consultant, College of Applied Medical Sciences,
King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
Dr Robert Hall:
Epidemiologist, Department of Epidemiology
and Preventive
Medicine,
Monash University, Melbourne, Australia
Dr Kamal Kk Datta:
Adviser Health Policy and Reform, Technical
Assistance Support
Team,
Government of West Bengal, Calcutta, India
Ms Jane Magoba-Nyanzi:
Public health communication specialist,
Harambee Social Change
Communication Associates, Kampala, Uganda
Dr Idris Mohammed:
Government representative, Medical doctor, academic, researcher
with
considerable public health experience
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Dr
Viroj Tangcharoensathien
Chair of the Sub-Team for Pakistan
Dr Viroj
Tangcharoensathien is Director of the International Health Policy
Program, in the Ministry of Public Health, Thailand.
In this
position, Dr Tangcharoensathien works closely with decision-makers in the
Ministry of Public Health and other government departments. He also works
independently as a policy researcher, and provides technical support in a
consultancy role to countries in the Asian Pacific Region. His primary areas of
expertise are health-care financing, health economics, development of health
insurance systems and equity in health. He designed Thailand's Social Health
Insurance System in 1991 and universal health coverage scheme in 2002.
Dr
Tangcharoensathien gained his medical degree from Mahidol University in
Thailand. He then worked for seven years in rural district hospitals along the
border of Thailand and the Lao People's Democratic Republic before undertaking
his doctoral training in health planning and financing at the London School of
Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Members of Team:
Mr Philippe Borel:
Specialist in humanitarian and development operations, La Ciotat,
France
Dr Rakhshinda Perveen: Consultant in development
management, training, communication
and
policy advocacy on issues of public health, gender and poverty eradication
Dr Corinne Rogers:
University of New Mexico, School of Medicine, Department of Family &
Community Medicine/MPH Program, Albuquerque, New Mexico
Dr Assad Hafeez:
Government representative. Former National Manager of Primary
Health,
public health expert with strong research, evaluation and
academic
background
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Professor Andrew Hall
Co-chair of Sub-Team to consider issues of
international spread
Professor Hall
has held the position of Professor of Epidemiology at the London School of
Hygiene and Tropical Medicine since 2001 and is also Chairman of the Joint
Committee on Vaccines and Immunisation of the United Kingdom.
During the
course of his career, he has lived and worked in Papua New Guinea and the Gambia
and has conducted research in more than 30 other countries. His research and
teaching primarily relate to vaccination and vaccine-preventable disease,
particularly primary liver cancer.
In relation to
polio he carried out a lameness survey in Papua New Guinea in the 1970s and
collaborated on trials of different formulations of oral polio vaccine (with the
United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) in the Gambia in the
1980s. During the 1990s he carried out consultancy work for the polio programme
in Papua New Guinea and investigated a polio outbreak in Multan, Pakistan.
Professor Hall
qualified in medicine at Guy's Hospital in London, and trained in epidemiology
at Southampton (PhD) and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (MSc),
both in the United Kingdom.
Members of Team:
Professor
Ezekiel Wafula: Professor, Department of Paediatrics and Child
Health, School of
Medicine, College of Health Sciences, University of Nairobi,
Kenya
Dr Huda Gashut:
Minister Counsellor at the Libyan Mission to the United Nations
and
international organizations in Geneva, Switzerland
Dr Annick Wouters:
Social scientist, International consultant
for advocacy and
communication for behaviour and social change and planning,
management, monitoring and evaluation of social development
programmes
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.Professor
Peter Ndumbe
Co-chair of Sub-Team to consider issues of international spread
Professor
Ndumbe has held the post of Dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences of the
University of Buea in Cameroon since 2006. He is also Professor of virus
immunology and Head of Department of microbiology and infectious diseases at the
Faculty of Medicine of the University of Yaoundé and Director of the Centre for
the Study and Control of Communicable Diseases, also at the University of
Yaounde.
Professor
Ndumbe serves on a number of scientific committees. He is Vice Chair of the
Scientific Committee of the Chantal Biya International Research Centre on
HIV/AIDS and related diseases, 2nd Vice Chair of the Cameroon Academy of
Sciences, Chair of the Scientific Committee of the National Immunization
Programme and Chair of the Laboratory Committee of the National Drugs, Vaccines
and Reagents Commission of the Ministry of Health of Cameroon.
Prior
to becoming Dean, Professor Ndumbe was the Deputy Director General of the
Institute of Medical Research and Studies on Medicinal Plants in Cameroon. He
was also the founding director of Camdiagnostix, a centre for the production of
diagnostic kits for the detection of HIV and Hepatitis B. Professor Ndumbe is
passionate about reducing the inequalities in access to healthcare and in this
regard is the focal point of the West and African Network of Researchers of the
African Council on Sustainable Health Development.
Professor
Ndumbe is also involved in a number of WHO committees. He chairs the Scientific
and Technical Advisory Committee of the Tropical Diseases Research programme,
the Task Force on Immunization of the African Region and the Advisory Committee
on Research of the Initiative for Vaccine Research, and is a member of both the
ad-hoc committee on polio eradication and the committee on variola and pox
infections.
Professor
Ndumbe trained as a physician at the University of Yaoundé, Cameroon and
subsequently studied medical microbiology, immunology and infectious diseases,
and clinical epidemiology at the Universities of London and Toronto.
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