Policy and Public Affairs

Michelle Halligan is the Director of Prevention and Performance Measurement and Evaluation at the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer, an organisation funded by the Canadian federal government to accelerate action on cancer.

She leads work with partners on pan-Canadian system change initiatives related to the elimination of cervical cancer, including improving immunisation rates, smoking cessation within oncology settings, and evidence-informed healthy public policy for cancer prevention. She also leads the organisation’s approach to measuring and evaluating its impact and progress towards the goals of the Canadian Strategy for Cancer Control. She has worked on cancer and chronic disease prevention, injury prevention, organisational culture and evaluation at national, provincial and local levels in Canada.

Michelle is a member of several scientific and advisory committees related to population health and evaluation. She holds a Master of Science in Health Sciences from Western University, and an Honours Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry and Integrative Biology from the University of Toronto.

Maisha Hutton has been the Executive Director of the Healthy Caribbean Coalition (HCC), the only regional alliance of NCD-focused civil society organisations, since 2012. Prior to joining the HCC, Maisha worked in HIV/AIDS/STI prevention for more than a decade.

At the HCC Maisha is responsible for the daily operations, providing strategic oversight and management across all areas. Maisha also serves as a member on the NCD Child Governing Council.

Shiriki Kumanyika is an Emeritus Professor of Epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. Prof Kumanyika’s research and policy activities focus on food and obesity, related health consequences, and approaches to addressing health inequities. She is an elected member of the USA National Academy of Medicine (formerly known as the Institute of Medicine). She has served on and chaired the National Academies Food and Nutrition Board. Prof Kumanyika is also a past president of the American Public Health Association.

In the global sphere, Prof Kumanyika is a nutrition adviser to the WHO, co-led the Policy and Prevention activities of the World Obesity Federation for more than a decade, and was a member of the Lancet Commission on Obesity from 2016 to 2019. She served on our Expert Panels on Diet, Nutrition and Cancer Prevention (2002–07) and Policy and Action for Cancer Prevention (2007–09).

Henry Li is a Senior Policy Advisor at the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, and leads policy efforts on building life-sciences ecosystems. Working across TBI’s health, science-and-technology and government-innovation policy teams, he has delivered major cross-functional projects on biotech, biosecurity and global health security, data, capital markets, and industrial strategy, including the New National Purpose reports led by Tony Blair in collaboration with William Hague.

Before working at TBI, Henry led on strategy, policy, research and delivery for the World Health Organisation Council on the Economics of Health For All, and on mission-led innovation and industrial policy at University College London. He holds a PhD from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

Dr Feisul Mustapha is a senior consultant public health physician best known for his leadership in the prevention and control of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in Malaysia. His special areas of interest include diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cancers and obesity. At the Ministry of Health Malaysia, he is currently the Director at the Perak State Health Department, responsible for the overall planning, coordination and implementation of all medical and public health programs and activities in the state of Perak.

He combines his high-level experiences in the government with active engagement of civil society and multilateral institutions. Dr Feisul is currently a Board Member for the International Advisory Board of the United Nations University — International Institute for Global Health (UNU-IIGH). He was previously Chair of the Scientific Advisory Group for the Monash University South East Asia Community Observatory (SEACO), and was a Member of the Strategic and Technical Advisory Group on the Prevention and Control of NCDs (STAG-NCD) for WHO Geneva.

Mike Rayner is a Professor of Population Health at the Nuffield Department of Population Health of the University of Oxford where the focus of his research is the promotion of healthy and sustainable diets.

Mike is also Chair of Sustain: the alliance for better food and farming in the UK and he is Chair of the Nutrition Expert Group for the European Heart Network. He is also an ordained priest in the Church of England.

Dr Si is the Deputy Director of the Public Health Division at the Pacific Community (SPC). He is a medical doctor (MBBS) with a Master of Public Health (MPH) and a PhD from the University of Sydney. In his current role, Dr Si provides leadership and technical oversight for programs within the Public Health Division, supporting health development across 22 Pacific Island Countries and Territories.

Previously, Dr Si served as a Research Fellow at the Boden Institute of Obesity and the Menzies Centre for Health Policy at the University of Sydney, Australia. He has also served as Team Leader for the Non-Communicable Diseases (NCD) Prevention and Control Programme and NCD Adviser at SPC, Director of Public Health for the Ministry of Health in Nauru and Public Health Physician with World Vision International, Aide Medical International and Specialist Hospitals in Asia.

Dr Si has extensive public health experience across the Asia-Pacific region and has chaired several scientific and technical advisory committees addressing NCD and childhood obesity. He has authored several peer-reviewed journal articles, manuals and guidelines and has presented his work at national, regional, and international health forums.

Suzanne Zhou is the Manager for Prevention at the McCabe Centre for Law and Cancer, a joint initiative of Cancer Council Victoria, the Union for International Cancer Control and Cancer Council Australia.

Suzanne leads the McCabe Centre’s work with countries to adopt effective regulatory measures to prevent NCDs, defend public health laws from legal challenge, and ensure policy coherence between health and trade and investment law.

The McCabe Centre is the WHO Collaborating Centre for Law and Noncommunicable Disease and a Knowledge Hub for the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, and has trained more than 200 people in 70 countries on the effective use of law to address NCDs.

Suzanne previously worked at Lawyers Collective in New Delhi as a research officer supporting the mandate of Anand Grover as the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to health, and holds an LLM in international law from Cambridge, an LLB/BMus from the University of Melbourne, and the Hague Academy of International Law’s Diploma in Public International Law. She served as co-director of the Hague Academy’s Centre for Studies and Research on epidemics and international law in 2020–21.