On Tuesday, September 19, 2023, at 9:00am, ICAP’s Grand Rounds webinar series presented on — Health Under Fire: Public Health in Conflict Zones.

This year has witnessed the highest number of violent conflicts since World War II, leading to a surge in humanitarian need and intensifying public health challenges in humanitarian settings. The International Rescue Committee (IRC) supports people whose lives are shattered by conflict and crisis to survive, recover, and gain control over their future.

In this Grand Rounds, IRC health experts spoke to proven strategies and promising innovations for meeting public health needs in conflict settings. With a focus on the IRC’s emergency health responses in Ukraine and Sudan, the session explored how common strategies have been adapted in two very different contexts. This session unpacked the challenges of and longer-term solutions to ensuring public health in chronic conflict zones. There was also an introduction of program activities in ICAP in Ukraine.

Presenters

Elizabeth Radin, director, Health Policy, International Rescue Committee

Elizabeth Radin has 20 years of experience leading global health research, programs, and policy. She has worked on a range of issues, including HIV, nutrition, maternal and child health, health systems strengthening, and health security with over 20 countries in Africa and Asia. Dr. Radin is currently the Director of Health Policy at the International Rescue Committee, where she works to develop and scale solutions to public health challenges in fragile and conflict-affected settings.

Dr. Radin joined the IRC in 2019, after receiving a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellowship to adapt lessons from the global AIDS response for emerging health and humanitarian crises. Prior to joining the IRC, Dr. Radin served as the Technical Director for the Population-based HIV Impact Assessment Project at ICAP at Columbia University. She continues to serve as a lecturer in epidemiology at the Mailman School of Public Health.

In addition to academic publications, Dr. Radin’s writing and comments have appeared in Time, The Atlantic, CNN, Project Syndicate, Columbia Journalism Review, Voice of America, and Vox. She holds a Masters in Public Policy from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and a PhD in Public Health from Oxford University.

Seema Jilani, senior technical advisor, Emergency Health, International Rescue Committee

Seema Jilani is an American Board-Certified Pediatrician who has worked in humanitarian settings, such as refugee rescue boats in the Mediterranean Sea, as well as in Ukraine, Afghanistan, Iraq, the West Bank, Gaza, Pakistan, Lebanon, Egypt, the Balkans, Sudan, and Nepal. Dr. Jilani is currently the Senior Technical Advisor for Emergency Health at the International Rescue Committee.

Previously, she was based in Beirut, where she worked for the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC). She completed her medical training at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children’s Hospital. For two years, Dr. Jilani served as a flight physician on medical evacuation flights for critically ill children for Texas Children’s Hospital.

As the 2016 recipient of the U.S. Department of State Senior Fulbright Scholar Award, Dr. Jilani was based in Istanbul, where she designed and taught a new university course to help doctors be more effective media and political advocates for their patients. Dr. Jilani was selected as a Truman National Security Fellow in 2015 and is also a writer whose work has been featured in The New York Times, BBC News, and The Guardian, among other media outlets.

Oksana Dereviankina, national coordinator, ICAP in Ukraine

Dr. Oksana Dereviankina is ICAP’s program coordinator and country representative for Ukraine. She is responsible for the overall oversight, operational planning, and implementation of ICAP activities in Ukraine. In this role, she leads the coordination of activities funded by the Ukraine Health Security Assistance Portfolio in support of Ukrainian health system recovery.

Dr. Dereviankina is a trained epidemiologist with tremendous multidisciplinary practical experience focused on strengthening public health. Her professional path is embroidered by implemented projects for shaping human life standards towards a better quality of life. Her achievements include implementing an “ABC Nutrition” educational program for children in Ukraine and Moldova as part of a preliminary school curriculum in 2009.

Since 2020, she has also supported activities to restore access to basic health services and ensure the proper and timely delivery of humanitarian aid to refugees as part of the Ukrainian delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross.