About us

The Global Health Policy Unit (GHPU) is a unique, cross-disciplinary team of researchers and lecturers who are committed to addressing the major global health policy challenges facing countries of all income-levels.

Our world-leading research and expertise allows us to offer practical solutions for decision-makers at all levels of governance, and collaborate with international actors such as the World Bank, World Health Organization, governments and other research and advocacy organisations globally.

Our research is organised around eight key themes:

Health policy processes
Power and governance
Health systems
Commercial determinants of health
Equity and health inequalities
Knowledges and epistemologies of health
Care in formal and informal settings
COVID-19: Response, recovery and preparedness

GHPU is also a leader in global health and health policy education and training, providing a range of programmes that attract the highest calibre of students from every region of the world.

If you have any questions about our degree programmes, courses, research, or other activities, please get in touch with us. Don’t forget to follow us on LinkedIn.

About us

Meet the team

Emily Adrion

Director, Global Health Policy Unit

emily.adrion@ed.ac.uk

Emily is a Senior Lecturer in Global Health Policy. Her broad research interests include health care costs and utilisation, public and private health insurance markets, managed care, and health care financing.

University profile

Sudeepa Abeysinghe

Senior Lecturer, Global Health Policy

Sudeepa.Abeysinghe@ed.ac.uk

Sudeepa's research focuses upon the relationship between knowledge and policy in the global management of risk.

University profile

Eleanor Brooks

Senior Lecturer, European Health Policy

eleanor.brooks@ed.ac.uk

Eleanor's research focuses on the political determinants of health in the context of EU health governance. She has a particular interest in fiscal governance and regulatory reform frameworks.

University profile

Jeff Collin

Professor of Global Health Policy

Jeff.Collin@ed.ac.uk

Jeff's research interests focus on health policy and global health governance, with a particular emphasis on the role of the commercial sector.

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Mark Hellowell

Senior Lecturer, Global Health Policy

mark.hellowell@ed.ac.uk

Mark is a senior lecturer in Global Health Policy at the University of Edinburgh. His research focuses on the financing and delivery of public health and healthcare.

University profile

Ben Kasstan-Dabush

Lecturer, Global Health Policy

ben.kasstan-dabush@ed.ac.uk

Ben is a lecturer in Global Health Policy. A medical anthropologist, his research focuses on ideas of health protection, in the context of childhood vaccinations, and sexual and reproductive health.

University profile

Kristina Kim

Research Fellow

kristina.kim@ed.ac.uk

Kristina's current project aims to develop an evidence synthesis of actions for addressing the commercial determinants of health at the local authority level. Kristina’s other research interests include tobacco control, decolonising global health and the relationship between evidence and health policy and practice.

University profile

Kathrin Lauber

Leverhulme Early Career Fellow

kathrin.lauber@ed.ac.uk

Kathrin's research explores power dynamics in policymaking, with a focus on the role of the commercial sector, and she has a particular interest in food systems and advertising regulation. Kathrin's Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship explores the production of ignorance in the context of animal agriculture's climate and health impacts.

University profile

Nason Maani

Senior Lecturer, Global Health Policy

nason.maani@ed.ac.uk

Nason is a senior lecturer in Global Health Policy at the University of Edinburgh. His research focuses on the structural and corporate determinants of health.

University profile

Kaveri Qureshi

Senior Lecturer, Global Health Equity

Kaveri.qureshi@ed.ac.uk

Kaveri’s research addresses how structures of racial capitalism, patriarchy and coloniality shape health inequality; experiences of family and intimate life; and the connections between family life and health.

University profile

May van Schalkwyk

Research Fellow, Global Health Policy

may.vanschalkwyk@ed.ac.uk

May's research focuses on explaining how commercial actors influence ideas, knowledge, science and policymaking. She has published research on the tobacco, alcohol, gambling, fossil fuels, opioid, pesticide and firearm industries, including on the activities of industry-funded organisations, industry influence of youth education and safety programmes, and the use of metaphor as corporate political activity.

Amrit Virk

Lecturer, Health Policy

a.virk@ed.ac.uk

Amrit's research is focused on health in low- and middle-income countries, spanning work across Malaysia, India, Thailand and Sierra Leone. Prominent themes include universal health coverage, health care financing, the political economy of health reforms and health systems strengthening.

University profile