This event has completed.

4/3/2024
4:00 PM - 7:00 PM EST

Please note this is a hybrid event - you have the option to attend in person or virtually. Registrations are required for all attendees. For in-person attendees, the event will run from 4 - 5:30 pm followed by a happy hour from 5:30 - 7 pm featuring drinks and light hors d'oeuvres. For virtual attendees, the livestream will be held from 4:10 - 5:30 pm (virtual attendees will be sent a link for the event via email).

Join us for an in-person and virtual event on the critical importance of supporting and safeguarding health workers on Wednesday, April 3rd at the historic DACOR Bacon House from 4-5:30 PM EST followed by a networking happy hour. Hear from globally recognized thought leaders on how frontline health workers are critical to the achievement of every global health goal and how the spaces where they work are increasingly targeted during conflict. Discussion will also focus on ways to further advance individual and institutional support for health workers throughout the health system. Keynote remarks and a high-level panel discussion on health workers’ role in various settings will be followed by a networking happy hour. 

This event is part of advocacy efforts by the Frontline Health Workers Coalition, Project HOPE, the Global Health Council and other partners during World Health Worker Week (WHWW) on April 1-7, the theme for which is Safe and Supported: Invest in Health Workers. It is the largest global campaign on health workers and WHWW has reached more than 15 million in the past years. This Washington, DC event will be a highlight in the week’s activities to elevate support for line health programs and the global frontline health care workforce.

Keynote Speaker
Dr. Atul Gawande is the Assistant Administrator for Global Health at the U.S. Agency for International Development, where he oversees a bureau that manages over $4 billion with a footprint of over 900 staff committed to advancing equitable delivery of public health approaches around the world.
 
The Global Health Bureau focuses on work that improves lives everywhere--from preventing child and maternal deaths to controlling the HIV/AIDs epidemic, to combating infectious diseases and preparing for future outbreaks.
 
Prior to joining the Biden-Harris Administration, he was a practicing surgeon at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and a professor at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He was founder and chair of Ariadne Labs, a joint center for health systems innovation, and of Lifebox, a nonprofit making surgery safer globally. From 2018-2020, he was also CEO of Haven, the Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway, and JP Morgan Chase healthcare venture.
 
In addition, Atul was a longtime staff writer for The New Yorker magazine and has written four New York Times best-selling books: Complications, Better, The Checklist Manifesto, and Being Mortal. 

Speaker
Leonard Rubenstein is Distinguished Professor of the Practice at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and Interim Director of its Center for Public Health and Human Rights. He is also a core faculty member of the Berman Institute of Bioethics and the Center for Humanitarian Health at Johns Hopkins University. Prior to coming to Johns Hopkins, Professor Rubenstein was a Senior Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace and before that President of Physicians for Human Rights. He has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the American Public Health Association’s Sidel-Levy Award for Peace. He is a graduate of Wesleyan University and Harvard Law School. He is a member of the Council of Foreign Relations and founded and chairs the Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition. He is the author of Perilous Medicine: The Struggle to Protect Health Care from the Violence of War (Columbia University Press, 2021).

Panelists
Anuradha Gupta is a global development leader currently serving as the President of Global Immunization at Sabin Vaccine Institute. As former deputy CEO of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, she executed successful global initiatives to improve the health of women and children and harness the full power of vaccines. She is globally acclaimed for her efforts to center Gavi policies, programs, and partnerships around vaccine equity, gender and communities. She also pioneered the concept of zero-dose children to focus on children who have not received even a single dose of the most basic vaccines, especially in conflict zones and drought-afflicted areas. She previously joined the pre-eminent Indian Administration Service in 1981 and held leadership positions in a wide range of areas including health, education, nutrition, women empowerment, urban development, poverty alleviation, public finance, and internal security.

Dr. Jennifer Kates is senior vice president and director of the Global Health & HIV Policy Program at KFF, where she oversees policy analysis and research focused on the U.S. government’s role in global health and on the global and domestic HIV epidemics. Widely regarded as an expert in the field, she regularly publishes and presents on global health and HIV policy issues and is particularly known for her work analyzing donor government investments in global health; assessing and mapping the U.S. government’s global health architecture, programs, and funding; and tracking and analyzing major U.S. HIV programs and financing, and key trends in the HIV epidemic, an area she has been working in for close to 30 years.

Margaret McDonnell is the Executive Director of United to Beat Malaria, a global grassroots campaign of the United Nations Foundation that advocates for increased bipartisan leadership and funding for global malaria programs such as The Global Fund, the U.S. President’s Malaria Initiative and the UN. Previously, Margaret ran strategic partnerships and helped lead the grassroots engagement and advocacy portfolio with the ONE Campaign, covering a wide range of global health and poverty issues. She worked with UNICEF in Botswana to develop media and civil society engagement strategies to further children’s rights within the context of the HIV epidemic and as a consultant for the U.S. Coalition for Child Survival to identify and implement advocacy and coalition-building best practices. 

Algene Sajery is a foreign policy strategist with experience in legislative, political affairs, and public service. As the founder and CEO of Catalyst Global Strategies, LLC, she focuses on helping advance, fund, and scale policies and initiatives that improve the lives and livelihoods of people in the developing world. Appointed by the Biden-Harris Administration, Algene also served as Vice President of the Office of External Affairs at the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation. She notably served as senior foreign policy and national security advisor to U.S. Senator Ben Cardin and was the democratic policy director of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Throughout her congressional tenure, she co-led efforts to enhance diversity in the federal foreign policy and national security workforce, spearheaded food aid reform, and played a key role in drafting significant legislation addressing human rights, national security, and foreign policy.

Moderator
Jed Meline is the Director of Policy and Advocacy at Project HOPE where he oversees all engagement at the national and global level on health and humanitarian assistance policy. Previously, he was a career USAID Foreign Service Officer with almost 25 years of service in Washington and overseas.  Most recently, he served as Deputy U.S. Global Malaria Coordinator at the U.S President’s Malaria Initiative. His diverse assignments in Washington also include service as the Director of Health and Humanitarian Assistance at the White House National Security Council, a Brookings Fellowship with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and a tour as staff on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Other positions include Acting Deputy Assistant Administrator in the Bureau for Democracy, Conflict, and Humanitarian Assistance and Senior Advisor to the Undersecretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs.

MC
Elisha Dunn-Georgiou is Global Health Council’s President and Executive Director. Elisha is a lifelong advocate with a passion for improving the health and well-being of vulnerable populations in the U.S. and globally. She has spent more than 20 years advancing political will and increasing resources for policies and programs to improve the health of communities worldwide. As an executive leader, Elisha has a demonstrated track record in strategic planning, program design, advocacy, and new business development. She has strong organizational and financial management acumen, with experience building empowered, goal-oriented, and cohesive organizational and program teams for global impact in public health policy and international development.