2021 CUGH Global Health Leadership Awards

Professor Patricia M. Davidson joined the University of Wollongong as Vice-Chancellor in May 2021. Prior to her current role, Professor Davidson was dean of the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing in Baltimore in the United States. In 2021 she was the recipient of the Consortium of Universities for Global Health (CUGH) Distinguished Leader Award. This honour celebrates her exceptional contributions to the advancement of global health worldwide.

As a global leader in nursing, health care, and advocacy, Professor Davidson’s work focuses on person-centred care delivery and the improvement of cardiovascular health outcomes for women and vulnerable populations. She has extensively studied chronic conditions, transitional care, palliative care, and the translation of innovative, acceptable, and sustainable health initiatives across the world.

Professor Davidson serves as counsel general of the International Council on Women’s Health Issues, and was a past board member of CUGH and secretary general of the Secretariat of the World Health Organizations Collaborating Centres for Nursing and Midwifery. She also serves on the Board of Health Care Services for the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in the United States.

Anthony S. Fauci, M.D., is director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) at the U.S. National Institutes of Health, where he oversees an extensive research portfolio devoted to preventing, diagnosing, and treating infectious and immune-mediated diseases.  Dr. Fauci has been a key advisor to six Presidents and their administrations on global HIV/AIDS issues, and on initiatives to bolster medical and public health preparedness against emerging infectious disease threats such as pandemic influenza and coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). As an HIV/AIDS researcher he has been involved in the scientific effort since AIDS was recognized in 1981, conducting pivotal studies that underpin the current understanding of the disease and efforts to develop therapies and tools of prevention.  Dr. Fauci was one of the principal architects of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which has helped save millions of lives throughout the developing world.

Dr. Fauci is a member of the US National Academy of Sciences, the US National Academy of Medicine and many other professional societies.  He is the recipient of numerous awards for his scientific and global health accomplishments, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom (the highest honor given to a civilian by the President of the United States), the National Medal of Science, and the Mary Woodard Lasker Award for Public Service.  He has been awarded 45 honorary doctoral degrees and is the author, coauthor, or editor of more than 1,300 scientific publications, including several major textbooks.

Dr. Cheryl Moyer is an Associate Professor of Learning Health Sciences and an Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Michigan. She holds a BA in Journalism and an MPH in Health Behavior and Health Education from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, as well as a PhD in Health Services, Organization and Policy from the University of Michigan. She joined the U-M faculty in 1997 and has since held a variety of increasingly prominent leadership positions both academic and administrative including Managing Director of UM’s Global REACH (Research, Education and Collaboration in Health).  Dr. Moyer’s primary research focus has been on maternal and neonatal health in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).  She has authored over 90 articles in peer review journals including a prominent role in producing a Comprehensive Maternal Health series issue published in The Lancet in 2016.  But of equal importance is her role in advancing research training for global health with over 80 mentees to date here in the U.S. and in SSA.  She is the PI or co-PI on over 20 global health and disparities-related research grants, totaling over $6 million USD, including a NIH-funded $1.7 million project to increase post-doctoral research training capacity in Ghana and a $1.4M grant from USAID to look at maternal health in Ghana. Throughout her career, her work has garnered numerous awards for writing, research, teaching and administrative leadership.

Grace Umutesi, MPH, is a public health practitioner, researcher and leader. A native Rwandan, she was recognized nationally for her outstanding academic promise in her youth and fully funded to complete her undergraduate studies at Oklahoma Christian University. Ms. Umutesi was selected as a Rwandan Presidential Scholar and received the Rwandan Imbuto Foundation Award three times. Ms. Umutesi earned her Master’s in Public Health with a focus in Global Health at Vanderbilt University where she was supported by the prestigious Goldberger Scholarship and the First Lady of Rwanda’s presidential scholarship.

While in her MPH program, Ms. Umutesi was awarded the Frist Global Health Leaders Fellowship to support an evaluation of a nurse anesthetist training program at AIC-Kijabe Hospital in Kenya, which grew out of a class project and lead to post-graduate employment with the Department of Anesthesiology at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. In this department, Ms. Umutesi was a key player managing training and research programs in Kenya. She was first author on a publication exploring the impact of nurse anesthetists at multiple levels of government hospitals. Ms. Umutesi also worked with the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on a polio eradication program in Guinea as well as a yellow fever vaccination campaign in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Deciding to return to and reconnect with her home country, Ms. Umutesi was selected for the Global Health Corps and later began managing the Research Department at Partners In Health’s sister organization, Inshuti Mu Buzima.