Prior to joining WHO in 2009, Dr.Prasad was a senior official in Government of India in various capacities in the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Finance, with his last position as Director, Public Health, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Government of India.

An expert in trade, taxes and anti-smuggling and in public health, he wears multiple hats.

Dr. Prasad holds a master’s degree in business administration with a specialization in public service and a bachelor’s degree in medicine and surgery.

Dr. Jennifer Ellis directs the Bloomberg Data for Health Initiative and also focuses on epidemiology and data use across the Bloomberg Philanthropies public health program. She has also held other professional positions at NYC DOHMH, Columbia University, and American Journal of Public Health for five years. Jennifer holds a PhD from Columbia University and a BA from Occidental College and previously served as an adjunct assistant professor for the City University of New York where she taught biostatistics and research methods.

Joanna Cohen, PhD, is the Bloomberg Professor of Disease Prevention, Director of the Institute for Global Tobacco Control and Chair of the Department of Health, Behavior and Society at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, USA. She has been involved in tobacco policy research for 30 years. Trained in epidemiology and health policy, her research focuses on factors that affect the adoption and implementation of public health policies and on evaluating their beneficial effects and unintended consequences. She served as a senior editor of the journal Tobacco Control for 20 years, recently completed a 3-year term as a Board member for the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco, and has been a voting member of the FDA’s Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee.

Jeffrey Drope, PhD, is Research Professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and director of Economics for Health. Jeff focuses on the nexus of major public health challenges (including tobacco control and alcohol use) and economic policymaking, especially taxation, trade and investment policy. His work integrates these areas to engender both improved public health outcomes and economic prosperity. His tobacco and alcohol work focuses particularly on taxation, illicit trade, economic costs, effects on employment, distributional impacts of health taxes, the science and regulation of novel products and the economics of tobacco farming. He is the author/editor of three books and more than 200 research articles, chapters and reports on the political economy of noncommunicable disease.

Dr Cheah Nuan Ping, PhD, is the Director for Pharmaceutical, Cosmetics and Cigarette Testing Laboratories at Singapore’s Health Sciences Authority (HSA) where she leads the team in quality assurance and regulatory compliance testing across a diverse array of consumer products, from cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, tobacco, ENDS and ENNDS. She is the Head of WHO Collaborating Centre for Tobacco Testing and Research at HSA.

Dr Cheah is the Chair of the World Health Organisation Tobacco Laboratory Network (TobLabNet), a position she has held since 2016. With more than 28 years of experience in analytical chemistry, she has been instrumental in establishing WHO TobLabNet Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), with 14 SOPs published to date. She actively supports WHO No Tobacco Unit’s initiatives, particularly in technical work, training and capacity building, and the implementation of the Partial Guidelines of Articles 9 and 10 of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC).

Jess is a public health and policy professional with over ten years of experience managing strategic partnerships, program development, and communication strategies for noncommunicable diseases in low-and-middle income countries and for the most pressing health issues impacting lives in the United States. Jess leads tobacco control efforts in Latin America with a focus in Mexico and Brazil and helps manage both the Bloomberg Overdose Prevention Initiative and Bloomberg American Health Initiative. Jess earned her master’s in public administration from Pace University and her bachelor’s degree from Syracuse University, both in New York. An Ecuadorean native, Jess is committed to elevating evidence-based science to promote equitable policy solutions through advocacy, education, and strategic alliances.

Dr Hebe Gouda is a Project Officer in the Tobacco Free Initiative, Department of Health Promotion at WHO Headquarters in Geneva where she has led the WHO Report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic since 2017. She has over two decades of experience in global health policy and epidemiological research in a variety of countries including Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and Egypt. She has a master’s in public health and a PhD in epidemiology, both from the University of Cambridge.

Lekan is currently a Professor and the Head of the School of Health Systems and Public Health at the University of Pretoria, having previously served as Dean and Deputy Vice Chancellor for Research and Innovation, both at the Sefako Makgatho Health Sciences University. He is the Director of the Africa Centre for Tobacco Industry Monitoring and Policy Research (ATIM) and the National Council Against Smoking. Prof Ayo-Yusuf’s research interests include behavioural epidemiology and policy evaluation for non-communicable diseases prevention, including addressing the commercial determinants of health. In particular, he has been an investigator and/or co-investigator on national and international research, including clinical trials and capacity-building projects related to tobacco use prevention, smoking cessation and policy advocacy.

Prof Ayo-Yusuf has authored or co-authored over 150 peer-reviewed scientific publications and technical reports. He is a fellow of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco and member of several editorial boards of international journals, and national and international scientific groups, including serving as a member of the Lancet Commission on Oral Health, member of the WHO Tobacco Regulation Study Group, the Chair of the standing Committee on Health of the Academy of Science of South Africa and of the Gauteng Provincial Health Research Committee.

Professor Emily Banks AM is a public health physician and epidemiologist. She works mainly on generating large-scale evidence to support action to improve population health and health care. Her main areas of expertise include the health impacts of tobacco and nicotine products, chronic disease, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health and healthy ageing. She is Head of the Centre of Epidemiology for Policy and Practice at the Australian National University, an NHMRC Investigator Fellow, a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences, a Visiting Professor at the University of Oxford and a Member of the Order of Australia.

Mark Hurley is the Vice President of Global Communications at the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, where he leads strategic planning and oversees international communications efforts. With a strong focus on advocacy, he ensures optimal support for country-level initiatives and serves as a key liaison to global partner programs, including STOP, GATC/COP, and the World Conference on Tobacco Control. Mark also manages the global communications budget, provides direct technical support to priority countries, and plays a pivotal role in the organization’s visibility and marketing efforts. A recognized thought leader in countering the tobacco industry, he contributes to cross-organizational initiatives and Bloomberg Initiative relations, including leading the annual report and communications coordination. As a member of the global management team, Mark is dedicated to advancing global public health through strategic and impactful communications.

Ms. Ritthiphakdee was an instrumental founder of SEATCA- the regional network of tobacco control advocates in ASEAN countries in 2000. She has since labored to build a strong and cohesive regional tobacco control movement, and continues to identify and cultivate emerging tobacco control advocates to ensure the sustainability of that movement.

In 2017, She and SEATCA team found the Global Center for Good Governance in Tobacco Control (GGTC), aiming to promote good governance and fight against tobacco industry interference globally. Through research, education, and policy development, they courageously expose deceptive strategies, counter misinformation, and challenge corporate influence.

In recognition of her work, Ms. Ritthiphakdee received a WHO award in 2001 and the Luther Terry Award on Outstanding Leadership in Tobacco Control from the American Cancer Society in 2006.

Leslie Rae Ferat is the Executive Director of the Global Alliance for Tobacco Control (formerly Framework Convention Alliance for Tobacco Control), a global network of civil society organisations working towards a world-free from the health, social and economic consequences of tobacco and tobacco use.

She joined GATC in 2018 and became Executive Director in 2020. Leslie also leads the work on key policy issues such as financing for development, the SDGs, NCDs and the COP. She is currently President-elect of the NCDA, and a member of the WHO Civil Society Working Group on NCDs.

Leslie has extensive international experience, mainly working in global health and prior to that, with low- and middle-income countries to collect and use data to drive sustainable development and meet the SDGs. Before joining GATC/FCA, Leslie worked for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the United Nations. She holds an MSc in International Development (Poverty and Inequality) from the University of Birmingham.

Kelvin Khow has been working with the World Health Organization (WHO) in various capacities for over two decades. He is presently Programme Manager at the Secretariat of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control at the WHO Headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland where one of his responsibilities is to oversee the technical aspects of the environment-related articles of the Convention and to help oversee the strategic and external communications work of the Secretariat. With over a decade of experience in tobacco control Kelvin was previously stationed in the WHO China office in Beijing (where one of his fondest memories was collaborating with young Chinese celebrities on a youth anti-tobacco campaign which went viral on social media) and the WHO Regional Office for the Western Pacific in Manila, Philippines. Prior to that, he was working at the WHO Country Office in Iraq/Jordan on health sector reform and United Nations and donor coordination and before that at the WHO Headquarters on mental health and substance abuse issues and strategic country support. Kelvin has studied at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, University of Michigan, USA and University of Melbourne, Australia.

Dr. Jennifer Ellis directs the Bloomberg Data for Health Initiative and also focuses on epidemiology and data use across the Bloomberg Philanthropies public health program. She has also held other professional positions at NYC DOHMH, Columbia University, and American Journal of Public Health for five years. Jennifer holds a PhD from Columbia University and a BA from Occidental College and previously served as an adjunct assistant professor for the City University of New York where she taught biostatistics and research methods.

Dr. Fenton Howell is medical graduate of University College Dublin, Ireland, and completed higher specialist training in Public Health Medicine in 1991. He is the former National Tobacco Control Adviser to the Department of Health, is a Clinical Associate Professor in Public Health in the Department of Public Health and Primary Care at Trinity College Dublin, and is a board member of the National Cancer Registry Ireland. Dr. Fenton Howell is a Fellow of both the Faculty of Public Health Medicine of Ireland and the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland. He is a past Dean of the Faculty of Public Health Medicine of Ireland, and past President of the Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland, the All Ireland Social Medicine Group and the Irish Medical Organization. He has previously served on the boards of ASH Ireland, the Tobacco Free Research Institute, the European Network on Smoking Prevention, the Institute of Public Health in Ireland and the Medical Bureau of Road Safety, and he chaired the Prevention Working Group for the Ireland–Northern Ireland–United States National Cancer Institute Cancer Consortium.

Dr. Gan Quan, PhD, is Senior Vice President at Vital Strategies, where he leads the Tobacco Control Division, comprising a global team working with governments and civil society partners around the world to reduce tobacco use, the leading preventive cause of deaths worldwide. The Division has supported work in more than 50 low- and middle-income countries with a focus on evidence-based tobacco control policies and implementation, capacity building, and countering interference from the tobacco industry.

Dr. Gan Quan has more than 15 years of international experience in health system building, policy implementation, government partnership, and policy research. Prior to joining Vital Strategies, Dr. Gan Quan spent 14 years with the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (The Union), first as Technical Advisor, then Director of China Office, and most recently as Director of Tobacco Control Department. Before joining The Union, Dr. Gan Quan was a research fellow at the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education at University of California, San Francisco.