AMR Advisory

Victoria is a qualified pharmacist and a tenacious leader! She has an extensive portfolio of practice spanning many sectors and countries and is widely recognised for her work at a global level. Victoria became the first executive director of the CPA in April 2016. She has built a strong team, redefined the charity’s mission and led the organisation from strength to strength, including pioneering the Commonwealth Partnerships in Antimicrobial Stewardship (CwPAMS) programme.

Mary is a retired nurse and a 2-time sepsis survivor who has become a public speaker to raise awareness of antibiotic resistance and the danger of the prevalence of bacterial infections in the healthcare setting. Since her infection she has studied microbiology, epidemiology, and worldwide statistics on infections as well as costs to patients and health centers.

Mary also speaks to antibiotic stewardship and visits the U.S. Congress annually to meet with her representatives and committees to help ensure funding for new research, novel therapies, and the antibiotic pipeline. She has also been featured in journals by the IDSA, Women’s Health, Harvard Health, and New England Journal of Medicine as well as having her story on websites by many in the healthcare realm. She resides in Louisiana, USA with her husband and pets and is now working on a book regarding her story to help others and give hope to those living with infections. Mary’s work can be seen at www.marymillard.org

John oversaw communications and engagement for the two-million-member social network Inspire. A former journalist, he was group publisher at HCPro, a health care regulatory publishing and training company. John served on the Association of Health Care Journalists’ board of directors and was an AHCJ officer. John is a volunteer committee member of the Society for Participatory Medicine and the nonprofit advocacy organizations SCAD Alliance and AnCan. He has a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree in journalism. He now is a healthcare communications consultant.

Ella Balasa is a patient advocate, consultant, and a person living with cystic fibrosis. She was diagnosed at 18 months old and has experienced countless hospitalizations since being a child. She has committed her time to empowering patients and advancing research and healthcare strategies through her connections with researchers, pharmaceutical companies, and patient organizations.

She is an advocate for the development of novel therapies for the treatment of antibiotic-resistant infections and speaks publicly to raise awareness of AMR as well as about the value of the patient perspective in research. Ella also has a passion for writing; distilling clinical information for patient communities, and sharing about the hardships yet triumph that comes with living with a chronic illness. She has been recognized as a 2022 Health Union Social Health Award winner for Healthcare Collaborator and serves on research committees with the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and the Patient Insights Board for Medidata.

Through opportunities working with healthcare organizations and sharing her health journey, she aims to affect the healthcare landscape by raising awareness of cystic fibrosis, empowering self-advocacy in other patients, and delivering valuable patient insights to organizations. More of her work and experiences can be found at www.ellabalasa.com.

Egwu Kenneth Chukwuebuka is a 500 level Pharmacy student at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. He is the Media and Publicity Team Lead at Community Health Awareness Network (CHANET) and a member of the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy (BSAC), the International Society for Infectious Diseases (ISID), American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH), and the Green Child International Organisation. He serves as the state coordinator for Enugu State Slum and Rural Health Initiative Network (SHRIN), and the Media Director for African Global Youth Forum (AGYF).

Kenneth has garnered tons of experience from lots of organisations where he volunteers. He served as the Class Rep for Leaders club Academy (LAC) during the 2019/2020 Academic session. He is presently an Ambassador for AMR Insight and has used his position to recruit many other students. He is the regional secretary for Living Every Day Above Depression (LEAD). He was a content creator for Speak Up Stand Out (SUSO) program, 2021 and a member of Climate Science Nigeria and serves as an Ambassador to his school. He has received numerous awards and certificates for his outstanding performances in essay writing and academics. In 2016, He received an award as the best-performing student in his class in secondary school. The same year he led his school, together with his team to finish as the first runner-up in Ochudo Foundation Quiz. In 2018, he won the quiz competition organized by the Pharmaceutical Association of Nigerians Students (PANS). In 2020, he finished as the first runner-up in the Pharmacy Day Essay Competition organized by Health Leap Initiative (HLI). Together with his partner, they finished as the 2nd runners-up in the Entrepreneurship Competition for Pharmacy Students organized by Venn Cares.

He has certifications in Leadership and Influence from Stratford College of Business and Management (United Kingdom) and Applied Social Media Marketing from Charles Start University (Australia). He is also a graduate of the Global Health Emerging Leaders Program, 2021 and was among the 25 students from sub-Saharan Africa accepted for the Ducit Blue Foundation One Health Pan African AMR Internship/Mentorship Program in 2021. He was among the 40 successful applicants globally accepted for the Future Leaders Against AMR 2022 program. He strongly believes in the use of Social Media to promote the safe use of antimicrobials. He was also among the 40 persons selected for the Pharma Incubation Hub Cohort 4 Mentorship Program where he serves as the Cohort Rep to facilitate the successful running of the program. He recently graduated from the Pharmacy Society of Nigeria-Young Pharmacists Forum (PSN-YPG) Research Mentorship Program and was among the few selected for the first Cohort.

He currently undergoes a training in Effective Altruism with Effective Altruism Nigeria and where he is remarked for his outstanding contribution. Kenneth is an ardent activist in the field of Antimicrobial Resistance and utilizes every opportunity to educate the public about Antimicrobial Resistance. His team, made up of 4 persons from Nigeria and 1 from Ghana recently finished as finalists in the Innovate4Health Competition organized by the John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, ReACT, and the International Federation of Medical Students Association (IFMSA) after proposing an intervention that will help reduce the arbitrary use of antimicrobials among Farmers in Northern Nigeria. Kenneth is currently the Coordinator of the One Health Scenario, a project organized by One Health in Action Initiative (OHAI) that aims to promote One Health. Together with Anna, Kenneth also host AMR Twitter space discussions aimed at educating the general public about AMR and creating AMR champions. Kenneth believes that no one is safe until everyone is safe and uses his social media as a starting point for his AMR advocacy.

Claire is a graduate of the University of Glasgow (MSc) and a director at KSHealthcare. She is a nurse by background and has worked with the World Health Organization (WHO) since 2008 as a consultant in various positions at global, regional and country level, after working at national level in Scotland for many years. For a range of organizations including WHO, she has and continues to work on infection prevention and control (IPC) and water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) in health care including; campaigning and advocacy, the development of guidance and implementation strategies and tools, training tools, strategy and action plan setting and country support.

She has been part of a number of WHO guidelines and reports, including the Core Components for IPC, Global guidelines for the prevention of surgical site infection and the Guidelines on hand hygiene in health care. She led on the WHO implementation manual for surgical site infection prevention as well as a number of other globally acclaimed tools aimed at turning recommendations into practice. She has received a number of awards, including for the WHO global annual hand hygiene campaign, and is widely published. She is a founding and board member of the World Surgical Infection Society, a past board member of the Infection Prevention Society (UK and Ireland), and an advisor on IPC and WASH related projects for the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Olayinka Fakorede is a medical doctor from Nigeria with an interest in infectious disease and antimicrobial resistance. She has led youth organisations like the World Health Students’ Alliance (WHSA) to organise an Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) Conference, as well as to write policy documents on control of infectious diseases and AMR and has also led AMR Advocacy Working Groups.

Olayinka will commence her Masters degree program at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in August 2023, in the Department of International Health with a focus on global disease epidemiology and control. Her goal is to continue strengthening global health systems to tackle infectious diseases and AMR.