Leadership

Our Executive Committee serves as NCD Child’s executive body that provides operational oversight for all NCD Child activities. The Executive Committee is supported by the Secretariat based at the Centre for Global Child Health at The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Canada.

Our Governing Council serves as NCD Child’s governing body and provides strategic guidance and direction in establishing policies and strategies that support NCD Child’s mission and goals that affect the integrity, effectiveness, and sustainability of activities and initiatives of NCD Child.

Meet our Committee and Council Members below.

executive committee

NCD Child Executive Director Zulfiqar A Bhutta of Pakistan and Canada

Zulfiqar A. Bhutta
Executive Director

read bio

Zulfiqar A. Bhutta

Dr. Zulfiqar A. Bhutta is the Executive Director of NCD Child, the Inaugural Robert Harding Chair in Global Child Health and Inaugural Ibn Sina Scholar in Global Child Health at the Hospital for Sick Children, Co-Director of SickKids’ Centre for Global Child Health, and Founding Director of both the Centre of Excellence in Women and Child Health, and Institute of Global Health and Development at Aga Khan University. He holds adjunct professorships at universities including Johns HopkinsUniversity and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. Dr. Bhutta is a Distinguished National Professor of the Government of Pakistan, co-Chair of the Maternal and Child Health oversight committee of WHO Eastern Mediterranean Region, the Coalition of Centres in Global Child Health Chairman, and a leading voice for health professionals supporting integrated maternal, newborn and child health globally.

Dr. Bhutta leads large research groups in Toronto, Karachi and Nairobi with special interests in scaling up evidence-based, community setting interventions and implementation of RMNCAH&N interventions in humanitarian contexts. His work with community health workers influenced maternal and newborn outreach programs for marginalized populations internationally and his group’s work with the WHO and PMNCH is guiding essential global intervention policies for women, children and adolescents.

Dr. Bhutta obtained his MBBS from the University of Peshawar and his PhD from the Karolinska Institute. He is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, and the Pakistan Academy of Sciences. In 2020 he was awarded the honour of Fellow of the Royal Society.

NCD Child Chair Marie Hauerslev of Denmark

Marie Hauerslev
Chair

read bio

Marie Hauerslev

Dr. Marie Hauerslev is a Danish physician and the Chair of NCD Child. Dr. Hauerslev is the Chair of the WHO GCM/NCD Lab on Youth and the Next Generation and a Commissioner on the Lancet Commission on Gender-Based Violence and Maltreatment of Young People. Alongside her global advocacy and research work, Marie is currently in her formal training in paediatrics at Herlev Hospital, Copenhagen. Previously, as Vice-President for External Affairs and Liaison Officer to WHO of the International Federation of Medical Students’ Associations (IFMSA), Dr. Hauerslev was the global leader of IFMSA’s external work, collaborating with the UN, WHO, World Medical Association and more. Marie was the driving force behind IFMSA’s leadership in the youth and NCDs movement in 2017. Dr. Hauerslev has worked at WHO Global Coordination Mechanism for NCDs focusing on children and youth.

NCD Child Governing Council Member Alafia Samuels from Barbados

Alafia Samuels
Chair-Elect

read bio

Alafia Samuels

Dr. Alafia Samuels is the retired Director of the George Alleyne Chronic Disease Research Centre at the University of the West Indies (UWI) in Barbados. She is a medical doctor trained at UWI in Jamaica. She holds a MPH (Masters in Public Health) and a PhD in Chronic Disease Epidemiology. Both degrees were awarded with honors from Johns Hopkins University. Her past employment includes being the Advisor in Chronic Diseases at PAHO/WHO, Professor of Public Health and Epidemiology at the University of the West Indies in Barbados, and managing Primary Health Care Services in Jamaica. She has served on the multi-sectoral Barbados National NCD (Non-Communicable Diseases) Commission. Currently, Dr. Alafia Samuels is a Lancet One Health Commissioner, member of PAHO TAG for NCDs in the Caribbean, co-chair of the World Obesity Foundation Policy and Prevention committee, and Advisor to Healthy Caribbean Coalition Her research interests include policy and practice in NCD prevention and control, clinical quality of care and evaluation of NCD programs. She was the Principal Investigator of the IDRC funded evaluation of the CARICOM Heads of Government 2007 Non-Communicable Diseases Declaration of Port of Spain.

NCD Child Past Chair Mychelle Farmer of United States of America

Mychelle Farmer
Past Chair

read bio

Mychelle Farmer

Mychelle Farmer is a pediatrician with a public health background and sub-specialty training in adolescent medicine. She has significant experience in international delivery of adolescent health programming, with a focus on the integration of non-communicable disease (NCD) screening and prevention into primary care and community-based settings. Currently, Mychelle is the Chief Medical Officer for Advancing Synergy, an organization that seeks to improve access to technology and research for the prevention and control of NCDs. She is an active member of the NCD Child Governing Council, American Academy of Pediatrics, and the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine. Mychelle is the co-chair of the NCD Roundtable for Global Health Council. She also serves as the Ambassador-At-Large for the International Association for Adolescent Health (IAAH), and she leads the Strategic Advisory Group on NCDs for the International Pediatric Association (IPA). She has a strong commitment to global health services that are culturally relevant and technically excellent.

NCD Child Governing Council Member Andrew Lesa of Samoa

Fale Andrew Lesa
Youth Representative

read bio

Fale Andrew Lesa

Fale is an experienced director and has been elected to public office on three separate occasions (the city council, a high school board, and a primary school board). He is currently a policy consultant with the Asian Development Bank and an independent director on the boards of Diabetes Foundation New Zealand and Leukaemia and Blood Cancer New Zealand. Indigenous to Samoa, he credits this heritage for his commitment to holistic healthcare in the 21st century. Fale was a keynote speaker at this year’s Global NCD Alliance Forum and was also a keynote speaker at last year’s Women Deliver where he lobbied for more radical interventions in healthcare. He has been published by the Archives of Disease in Childhood journal where he highlights the rampant inequalities in western healthcare. He is also involved in NCD Child’s first ever youth programme where he represents the Asia Pacific region. Fale is passionate about investing in more indigenous literature and policy on NCD’s and believes that serving on the governing council will allow him to contribute to this vision. He is inspired by the creativity and innovation of young people which he believes is fundamental to NCD prevention.

Governing Council

Tamera Coyne-Beasley

read bio

Tamera Coyne-Beasley

Dr. Tamera Coyne-Beasley is the Derrol Dawkins, MD Endowed Chair in Adolescent Medicine, Division Director for Adolescent Medicine, Vice-Chair of Pediatrics for Community Engagement, and Professor of Pediatrics and Internal Medicine at the University of Alabama Birmingham. Her areas of expertise and training include adolescent medicine, preventive medicine, health services research, epidemiology and public health. Her research, academic, community engagement, and policy and program development focus on adolescent health and well-being, and risk behaviors including sexual and reproductive health, violence prevention, substance use prevention, health promotion and disease prevention, reducing health disparities, improving health care access, community engaged research, practice based research, immunizations and global health. Her global heath work has included the strategic development of adolescent health plans for countries and international communities. Dr. Coyne-Beasley was appointed by the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP). She continues to contribute towards the review of scientific immunization evidence and development of ACIP vaccine policy. She also served as a member of The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s committee on Applying Lessons of Optimal Adolescent Health to Improve Behavioral Outcomes for Youth. Dr. Coyne-Beasley is also a Past President of the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine, an international organization dedicated to the health and wellbeing of adolescents and young adults and the providers who serve them.

Luis Manuel Encarnacion

read bio

Luis Manuel Encarnacion

Luis M Encarnacion holds a BA in International Relations, a diploma in Political Science by the Institute d’Études Politiques (Sciences Po) – France, and a MSc in International Health Policy at the London School of Economics (LSE). He holds certificates in legislative planning, public health, health economics, and civil society management. Between 2013-2016, Luis was the Director of Fundación Mídete, a Mexican non-government organization working on prevention and control of obesity and diabetes. Between 2013-2017, he was the Coordinator of the ContraPESO Coalition, becoming one of the most important spokespersons and advocates of the SSBs tax in Mexico; as well as the Co-coordinator of the México Salud-Hable Coalition, the national NCD alliance with more than 100 members. He was also the leader of the Mexico City chapter of the Young Professionals Chronic Disease Network (YPCDN). In 2018, Luis became a member of NCD Child’s Governing Council for the period 2018-2020, and his tenure was renewed for a second term from 2020-2022. He’s currently Capacity Development Manager at NCD Alliance based in Mexico City, where he leads the NCDA Advocacy Institute, an initiative supporting coalition building and advocacy efforts in Latin America, Africa and Asia, promoting the strengthening of civil society as platforms for NCD policy change.

Mychelle Farmer

read bio

Mychelle Farmer

NCD Child Governing Council Member Nicola Grey from the United Kingdom

Nicola Gray

read bio

Nicola Gray

Dr. Nicola Gray is Senior Lecturer in Pharmacy Practice at the University of Huddersfield, England, UK. She is also an Affiliated Researcher for the UNESCO Chair / WHO Collaborating Centre ‘Global Health and Education’ at the University of Clermont Auvergne, France. She has held a number of research and policy roles in the pharmacy sector, including as a Regional Liaison Pharmacist at the Royal Pharmaceutical Society and past academic roles at the Universities of Nottingham, London, Manchester and Central Lancashire. Her research and policy interests focus on children and young people’s health, the prevention and management of non-communicable diseases, health/medicines literacy, and the role of pharmacists in improving health and wellbeing. She received a Pharmaceutical Care Award for 1999 in the team who created the first no-charge pharmacy-based emergency contraception service in England. Nicola was a Harkness Fellow in International Health Care Policy in the USA in 2001/2 studying adolescents’ use of the Internet for health information at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Rochester, NY. Nicola has served as a Governing Council Member of NCD Child since 2018 and chairs their Task Force on Essential Medicines and Equipment. She represents NCD Child in the UK Working Group on NCDs where she provides a specific child and youth perspective for a lifecourse approach to the Group’s work. She was awarded Fellowship of the US Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine in 2010 for national leadership and research, and Fellowship of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society in 2018 for distinction in the profession of pharmacy. She is a Trustee of the UK Association for Young People’s Health and the Vice-President for Europe of the International Association for Adolescent Health. Nicola believes that multidisciplinary / multisectoral working is the way to harness all the skills of healthcare, public health and education in policymaking that recognises that health for children and young people is always linked to their social and geographical context. She also wants to see Governments taking a more long-term view of population health, recognising that investments made now in children and young people – in order to prevent development of NCDs and/or to optimise control of existing NCDs to avoid complications – will bear fruit well into the future.

Marie Hauerslev

read bio