CIGBS Advisory Board

Sharon Hrynkow's career as a neuroscientist and global health leader spans more than 20 years in the public and private sectors. She was the inaugural president of the Global Virus Network, a non-profit organization working to prevent the spread of viral disease, including pandemic threats (2012 - 2015).  Her career in public service includes over a decade of senior executive leadership roles at the National Institutes of Health, including as deputy director, Fogarty International Center (2000 - 2007), acting director of Fogarty (2004 - 2006), associate director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (2007 - 2008) and counselor and senior advisor for science at the U.S. Department of State (2010 - 2012).

Hrynkow has developed and launched innovative programs and policies on a range of global health issues, including AIDS, emerging diseases, chronic disease and public health impacts of climate change. She has worked at the highest levels with government partners and launched innovative programs to train tomorrow's health leaders worldwide. She currently serves as senior vice president for Medical Affairs at CTD Holdings, a publicly traded company, where she leads the clinical trial program to bring to market a drug against a rare and fatal disease. She is director of Forward Industries.

Hrynkow is an elected member of the Council on Foreign Relations and an elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Prior to CUGH, Keith Martin served as a Member of Parliament in Canada and was appointed in 2004 to the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada. As a parliamentarian, he created CanadaAid.ca, an online platform to facilitate partnerships between universities, governments, multilateral institutions, NGOs and the private sector.

Martin has been on numerous diplomatic missions to areas in crisis including Sudan, Zimbabwe, Mali, Niger, Sierra Leone, Colombia and the Middle East. He has traveled widely in Africa and served as a physician in South Africa on the Mozambique border during that country’s civil war. He is the author of more than 150 editorial pieces published in Canada's major newspapers and has appeared frequently as a political and social commentator on television and radio. From 1997-2000, he created and moderated the nationally syndicated, current affairs television program "Beyond Politics." He is currently a board member of the Jane Goodall Institute, editorial board member for the "Annals of Global Health" and an advisor for the International Cancer Expert Corps. He has contributed to the Lancet Commission on the Global Surgery Deficit, is a current commissioner on the Lancet-ISMMS Commission on Pollution, Health and Development and is a member of the Global Sepsis Alliance.  

Martin’s main areas of focus are in global health, foreign policy, security, international development, conservation and the environment. He is particularly interested in strengthening human resources capabilities and scaling up initiatives in low-income settings that improve environmental sustainability and human security.

David Ripin oversees CHAI’s work on increasing access to medicines and diagnostics for HIV, malaria, tuberculosis and other disease areas through the use of sustainable market interventions. CHAI’s Access program has successfully implemented agreements with pharmaceutical companies to lower the price of key drugs and diagnostics by up to 80 percent, among other achievements. Ripin also oversees the strategy and work of CHAI’s Malaria program.

Ripin joined CHAI in 2007 to lead its Pharmaceutical Sciences Team in conducting research and development work. The team worked on reducing the cost of key drugs through formulation, manufacturing and sourcing improvements, as well as conducting the transfer of these processes to manufacturing partners.

Ripin is actively involved in setting international priorities for HIV drug optimization work, organizing the "Conference on Antiretroviral Drug Optimization" in 2009. Before joining CHAI, he worked at Pfizer, Inc. for 10 years as part of the R&D group, focusing on the commercialization and manufacturing of drug candidates.

Ripin received his bachelor's degree in Chemistry and Asian Studies from Washington University in St. Louis and his PhD in Chemistry from Harvard University.

Michael T. Mbizvo is the Zambia Country Director for Population Council, which he joined in 2014, covering the SADCC region and is also employed as a professor at the College of Health Sciences, University of Zimbabwe.

Mbizvo was the director of the World Health Organization’s Department of Reproductive Health Research (RHR) from 2009-2013, holding multiple WHO positions previous to this. As director, he led a co-sponsored UNDP/UNICEF/ UNFPA/WHO/World Bank Special Program for Research, Development and Research Training in Human Reproduction. Mbizvo has played a key role in advancing reproductive health and research capacity within the international development agenda, which has included development and implementation of innovative approaches to improve reproductive health globally, in particular in low and medium-income countries.

As a professor in he University of Zimbabwe Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, he supervises and mentors post-graduate and medical students while implementing research to improve sexual and reproductive health and prevent HIV. He also co-founded the Wits University SRH/HIV and Gender course, which trains postgraduates from across Africa. He has presented hundreds of scientific papers and published widely in the fields of sexual and reproductive health, and HIV/AIDS, including three books.

Mbizvo comes from Zimbabwe. He did prostgraduate training in the U.S.  at the Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine, Eastern Virginia Medical School. He also trained in Australia at Monash University and Prince Henry Institute of Reproductive Medicine, in Ireland at Galway University, and in Sweden at Umea University.

Tungamirirai Simbini is a trained medical doctor with post graduate qualifications in Health Informatics and Information Systems. He has a BSc and MBChB degrees from the University of Zimbabwe. He has a Master of Science in Health Informatics from Oregon Health & Sciences University, U.S.

Simbini has experience in Health Management Information Systems spanning 16 years at national and regional levels. He currently is a lecturer in Health Informatics at Africa University. He is the Principal Investigator for the Zimbabwe Human Resources Information Systems project supported by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Simbini consults for the Republic of Malawi's Health Management Information Systems. He also is running a private company that develops software solutions in the health sector.

Simbini is currently studying enterprise architectures for ways to improve the exchange of health information. He mentors university students in health informatics.

Jane Kengeya-Kayondo is a medical doctor with a Master’s degree in epidemiology and a Diploma in Public Health with over  30 years’ experience in health research, research coordination and research capacity strengthening.

Kengeya-Kayondo has worked for over 15 years at the World Health Organization in Tropical and infectious Diseases Research coordination and leadership positions. Kengeya-Kayondo has served the Wellcome Trust as the Special Advisor for Africa (current) and with the Africa Research Excellence Fund(AREF) as the Regional Coordinator, East & Southern Africa (current on secondment from the Wellcome Trust).

Kengeya-Kayondo has published many scientific papers and led the production of several WHO publications. Her autobiography “The Hero Within” published in 2014 is highly sought after in Africa and globally.

Dr. Karen Webster-Kerr is the Principal Medical Officer, National Epidemiologist, Ministry of Health, Jamaica. She has been in public health practice for 20 years and spent most of her time at the Local Health Department in Kingston and St. Andrew (KSA). While at the KSA Health Department she led the response to the large urban outbreak of malaria, 44 years after it was eradicated from Jamaica. The strategies employed resulted in the re-elimination of malaria.

In her current position she leads on national health programmes and policies especially as it relates to epidemiology and research. Dr. Webster-Kerr is Chair of the Health Thematic Working Group for Jamaica’s National Development Plan: Vision 2030. She is Principal Investigator for the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention Grant: Surveillance and Response to Avian and Pandemic Influenza in Jamaica and the Co-Principal Investigator for the Jamaica Health and Lifestyle Survey III 2016/2017.