Dr Abbas U Bhuiya, Ph.D
Interim Chair, COHRED and Deputy Executive Director, icddr,b
Dr Abbas Bhuiya is trained as a demographer and statistician and is a long timer at icddr,b. Before his current position, he was the head of the Poverty and Health Programme at icddr,b. He has nearly 30 years of professional experience in the field of community health research with special focus on health services for the poor/vulnerable and equity issues, behaviour change, and facilitation of community initiatives for the improvement of health, especially of the poor. Dr Bhuiya is experienced in designing and conducting large surveys, carrying out operations research, implementation of innovative health services, evaluation of health and development programmes, and monitoring of outcomes with equity focus. He also has experience in combining quantitative and qualitative research methods. Dr Bhuiya has familiarity with the development and public health challenges facing the developing world and contemporary intervention programmes to tackle them. He has track records of attracting large grants and successfully implementing them. He has practice in leading large groups of multidisciplinary researchers.
Dr Bhuiya was elected to the COHRED Board for his first 3-year term in 2005.

Dr Don de Savigny, PhD
Head of the Health Systems Interventions Unit
Dr. de Savigny is an epidemiologist and public health specialist. He is currently Professor and Head of the Health Systems Interventions Unit in the Department of Public Health and Epidemiology at the Swiss Tropical Institute, University of Basel. He is also an Honorary Professor and former Heath Clark Lecturer at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Don has extensive experience in conducting and facilitating health research in developing countries and has lived and worked for many years in Africa, most recently as lead facilitator for the Tanzania Essential Health Interventions Program (TEHIP) for the Ministry of Health in Tanzania.

Between 1988 and 1996 he was Principal Health Specialist for the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), Canada. Prior to that, he was the Head of the Swiss Tropical Institute Field Laboratory in Tanzania (now the Ifakara Health Research and Development Centre).

He is on a number of advisory panels including Chair of the Health Metrics Network Technical Advisory Group, Chair of the WHO Roll Back Malaria Working Group on Scalable Malaria Vector Control, the Scientific Advisory Committee for the INDEPTH Network of Demographic and Health Observatories, the WHO African Malaria Expert Committee, the Gates Malaria Partnership. His current research focuses on interventions to strengthen health systems in developing countries, and on the health system effects of Global Health Initiatives for scaling up access.

Dr Debora Diniz
ANIS Institute of Bioethics, Human Rights and Gender
Brazil
Debora Diniz is a Brazilian professor of public health and bioethics and one of the founders of the NGO Anis – Institute of Bioethics, Human Rights and Gender, an institution of research and advocacy dedicated to monitor the Brazilian Supreme Court. In 2004, Anis worked in the first case on abortion to a Supreme Court in Latin America. She now is a board member of the International Women’s Health Coalition and International Association of Bioethics and her fields of research are reproductive and sexual rights, access to high cost medicine, psychiatric prisons, secular state and research ethics. As a human rights documentary filmmaker, her films won more than 70 international and national awards.

Dr Sambe Duale, MD, MPH
Dr. Duale is Research Assistant Professor, Department of International Health and Development, at the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine (USA), and Technical Director and Infectious Disease Advisor for the Africa’s Health in 2010 initiative supported by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Africa 2010 promotes the adoption of policies and strategies for sustainable health and human resources development. Dr. Duale advises the USAID Bureau for Africa and for the design, management and evaluation of research projects on a wide range of public health issues, including infectious diseases, HIV/AIDS, child survival, surveillance, emerging threats and crisis response.

Dr. Duale was elected to the COHRED Board for his first 3-year term in 2005.
Africa’s Health in 2010 project
1875 Connecticut Av., NW, Suite 900
Washington, D.C. 20009
Tel +1 202 884 8809
Fax: +1 202 884 8447

Prof Carel IJsselmuiden, MD, MPH, FFCH(SA)
Director Council on Health for Development (COHRED)
South Africa
Carel is a public health physician and epidemiologist. He has worked in rural medicine, peri-urban and urban health care and environmental health services, as well as in academic public health education and research ethics training. He has also published in various areas in applied research and public health. Carel was the founding Director of the University of Pretoria’s School of Health Systems and Public Health until his appointment as COHRED Director in January 2004.

Prof. IJsselmuiden, as COHRED Director, is ex-officio member of the Board.

Dr Jo Ivey Boufford, M.D
President, New York Academy of Medicine
Dr. Boufford was appointed President of the New York Academy of Medicine in 2007. Prior to this she was Professor of Public Service, Health Policy & Management at the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and Clinical Professor of Paediatrics, New York University School of Medicine. Over the past 20 years she has held a number of senior positions on the field of academic and public health in the United States and in the United Kingdom. These include positions as Dean of the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University (1997-02); Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (1993-97); U.S. representative on the Executive Board of the World Health Organization (WHO) (1994-97, reappointed in 1998), Director, King’s Fund College, UK (1991-93) and President of the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation (1985-89). Dr Boufford attended Wellesley College, has a BA in Psychology (University of Michigan USA) and M.D. (University of Michigan Medical School). She is Board Certified in paediatrics.
Dr. Boufford was elected to the COHRED Board for her first 3-year term in 2005.

Dr Suzanne Jacob Serruya
Director of the Department of Science and Technology
Suzanne Jacob Serruya completed Medical School at the Federal University of Pará, Belém – Brazil, in 1985, a Specialist Certificate in Gynecology & Obstetrics in 1988, a Masters degree in Development Planning in 1993 and a PhD in Gynecology & Obstetrics in 2003. Dr. Suzanne Serruya has an extensive experience in the academic field as a professor at the University of Pará since 1988. Dr. Serruya also coordinated specialization courses, such as, the Internship Program in Gynecology and Obstetrics; the Research Development, Graduate Studies; and the Labor Medicine course.

Dr. Suzanne Serruya brings to COHRED 15 years of experience in the Women’s Heath Policies implementation. She worked in the promotion and articulation of the women’s health research, planning, supervising and evaluating the government programs. She also participated in the coordination of the inter-institutional projects where she organized campaigns for local populations and the cervical cancer control pilot project.

Since 2003 she has joined the Ministry of Health working in the Science and Technology Department (DECIT), initially as the Coordinator for Institutional Development. In March 2005 she was appointed Director of this Department, position presently held where she works in the health research field in the development and implementation of benchmarks and processes to insure quality service; and plays a role as a liaison for internal and external offices, organizations, and federal agencies. Besides, she contributes in the implementation and evaluation of the National Policy on Science, Technology and Innovation in Health and the National Priority Agenda in Health Research. Dr. Serruya promotes and articulates strategic researches in health with S&T agencies, state, municipal health secretariats and the federal district. Furthermore, her work strengths the system of ethical review of research involving human subjects and the committees in the performance of their objectives by implementing sound infrastructure processes and establishment qualifications for its members.

Dr Pascoal Mocumbi
High Representative, European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership
former Prime Minister of Mozambique

Dr. Pascoal Mocumbi is the High Representative of the European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP) since March 2004. His mandate is to raise the visibility of the EDCTP and gaining political support, particular within Africa, and to contribute to the EDCTP’s fundraising activities. The Partnership aims to contribute towards reducing the burden of the main poverty-related diseases and transferring empowerment to the developing world. Its goal is to accelerate the development of new or improved clinical interventions against HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, and build leadership in health research in developing countries, so that they will be able to diagnose and respond to their own needs.

Dr Mocumbi is also WHO Good Will Ambassador for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health for the African Region. He also has active role in global health initiatives serving on the Coordinating Committee of the Global HIV Vaccine Enterprise, contributes to the establishment of global coordinating mechanisms for the development of a preventive vaccine against HIV. He serves as Commissioner in the WHO Commission on Social Determinants of Health (CSDH), and on the boards of the Alliance of Health policy and Systems Research (AHPSR), the International Advisory Board (IAB) of Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP), the International Women Health Coalition (IWHC), and the Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV) and African Medical Research Foundation (AMREF). In 2005 he was elected to membership of the Institute of Medicine (IOM).

Dr Mocumbi was Prime Minister of the Republic of Mozambique from 1994 to 2004. Prior to that, he headed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs during eight years and the Ministry of Health for 6 years. He received his medical degree from the University of Lausanne, did his internship in Switzerland, and practiced medicine as obstetrician & gynaecologist in hospitals throughout Mozambique. As Prime Minister he led the establishment of Mozambique the National AIDS Council to coordinate the implementation of the national HIV response. Dr Mocumbi served (1989-1998) in the World Health Organization’s Task Force on Health and Development.

Dr. Mocumbi is committed to the importance of public health as an essential arm for sustainable development. Dr Mocumbi has expertise in health systems and women’s health issues. As Mozambique Heath Minister established the MCH nurses career and initiated the training of non-physicians health professionals for delivering lifesaving emergency obstetric care necessary to reduce maternal mortality. As Prime Minister, he contributed to the substantial progress in fighting poverty and improving human development, and to the transformation of a war-torn Mozambique into one of the well-governed and fastest growing economies of Africa.

Dr Donald T. Simeon
Director, Caribbean Health Research Council
Dr. Donald Simeon has been Director of the Caribbean Health Research Council since 2002. Prior to that he was Senior Lecturer in Biostatistics, Faculty of Medical Sciences, University of the West Indies. A citizen of Trinidad and Tobago, Dr. Simeon was educated at the University if the West Indies (PhD Nutrition) and the London School of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, University of London (MSc Medical Statistics).

He is a chartered Statistician and Fellow with the Royal Statistical Society, UK as well as a registered Public Health Nutritionist, Nutrition Society, UK. He is a Board Member of the Geneva-based Council on Health Research for Development (COHRED) and a member of Trinidad and Tobago Association of Nutritionists and Dietitians, American Society for Nutritional Sciences, International Biometric Society Network for Central America and the Caribbean and the Management Committee of the Essential National Health Research Council of Trinidad and Tobago. He also serves on the Editorial Board of the West Indian Medical Journal.

Dr Simeon has extensive research experience as evidenced by the publication of over 50 scientific papers in peer-reviewed international journals, in addition to chapters in books/encyclopedia and other reports. He has also made dozens of oral presentations of research findings at international scientific and regional professional conferences.

Dr Aissatou Toure Balde
Head, Laboratory of Parasite Immunology
Dr Aissatou Touré, is a pharmacist biologist specialised in Immunology, and a researcher at the Pasteur Institute in Dakar where she heads the Laboratory of Parasite Immunology and conducts research in the area of immunology of malaria.

Dr Touré is a member of the Senegalese National Program against Malaria, where she participates in the definition of priorities for malaria research. Since 2002, she has been a member of the African Committee (Developing Countries Coordinating Committee or DCCC) of the European program EDCTP (European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership) serving as focal point for the activities in the field of ethics. This work includes building capacity, strengthening of national ethics committees, etc.

Dr Touré has been a member of the Senegalese Scientific and Ethics Committee since 2003, tasked with evaluating scientific and ethical aspects of projects in health research, and advising health authorities in the area of ethics. She is also a member of the Project Advisory Group (since 2004) that advises WHO on the Meningitis Vaccine Project (MVP). The MVP is the result of a partnership between PATH and WHO for the development of a meningitis vaccine specific to Africa’s needs, to eliminate this disease as a public health threat.

Since 2006 Dr. Touré has been a member of the UNESCO International Committee on Bioethics.