The Team

Jessica Allen

Dr Jessica Allen is a Deputy Director of the Institute of Health Equity. Her main activities are working to embed a social determinants approach to health inequalities in England and globally. She is co-director of the Review of Social Determinants of Health and the Health Divide in the WHO European Region and was previously Project Director of the Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England post-2010 (the Marmot Review). Prior to her work at UCL she was head of Health and Social Care at IPPR, Research Fellow in Public Health at the Kings Fund, and worked at Unicef and LSE. She has published and broadcast widely on issues relating to health and social care policy. She holds a doctorate from the University of London.

Matilda Allen

Matilda Allen is a Project Support Officer for the Institute of Health Equity, primarily working on organisation of events, responsibility for the website, and supporting research tasks for the team. Prior to this she studied Politics at the University of Manchester, worked on the Marmot Review, and lived in Beirut for a year, where she worked for the Arab Centre for the Development of the Rule of Law and Integrity. She is currently studying part time at the London School of Economics (LSE) for a masters in Philosophy and Public Policy.

Reuben Balfour

Reuben Balfour is a Research Fellow for the Institute of Health Equity.  His main responsibilities are to provide research support for the organisation.  Prior to this, he worked as a research assistant at the Institute for Public Policy Research working on two reports looking at the UK and EU’s transition to a low-carbon economy.  Reuben has an MSc in Public Policy from University College London and studied Social Policy at the University of Leeds. 

Ruth Bell

Dr Ruth Bell is a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Epidemiology & Public Health at UCL. Ruth is active in research and advisory roles to advocate and implement the global health agenda for health equity. Ruth coordinates advocacy for health equity to national and international policy and research fora. Her current activities include knowledge synthesis for European and other international projects in the area of social determinants of health. She directs the UCL international summer school on Health and Society and coordinates a module on social determinants of global health for the MSc in Social Epidemiology in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health. She was a member of the UCL based scientific Secretariat within the CSDH(2005-08) that was set up by the World Health Organisation.

Luke Beswick

Luke Beswick is an Administrator at the Institute. Prior to this he worked for the Medical Research Council Head Office as a grants administrator and then most recently as manager of the grants payment team. He has a B.Sc. in Biology from the University of Manchester.

Angela Donkin

Dr Angela Donkin is a Senior Advisor at the Institute of Health Equity. She has previously worked in the civil service and in academia. She led teams in the Department of Work and Pensions and the Cabinet Office on Health, Work and Wellbeing and on Early Intervention. She has also worked in the Office for National Statistics on health inequality statistics. Prior to joining the civil service she was at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and the University of Nottingham, and has published work relating to food choice, access to a healthy diet, and a minimum income for healthy living.

Peter Goldblatt

Peter Goldblatt is a Deputy Director of the Institute. His main activities are in the field of measurement and monitoring and in co-ordinating European and other international project to review the social determinants of health. He was previously at the Office of National Statistics (ONS). He was seconded from ONS to University College London (UCL) for the duration of the Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England post-2010 (the Marmot Review). While at ONS, he was the Chief Medical Statistician from 1999 to 2008, principally concerned with leading the Divisions that were the key providers of ONS analyses of health and demographic statistics. Prior to joining ONS, he had worked at the Home Office, the Department of Health, the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys, City University and Manchester University.

Mike Grady

Dr Mike Grady is a principal adviser at the Institute. His research interests include community development, empowerment and health inequality He works with regions and local agencies across England and with WHO Healthy Cities Network across Europe to embed a social determinants of health approach in their work. He worked on the Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England post-2010 (the Marmot Review). Previously, he was an NHS Chief Executive and Chief Officer in a large Metropolitan Authority. Mike has an MA in Social and Community Work, a Post Graduate Diploma in Management Studies and a D. Prof in Health Leadership. He is an Expert Advisor to the Centre for Public Scrutiny and has worked with a number of Councils to implement the new Patient and Public Involvement Schemes (LINks) and support OSC functions. He is an honorary Senior Lecturer at Leeds Institute of Health Sciences.

Michael Marmot

Professor Sir Michael Marmot is the Director of the Institute of Health Equity. More information about Michael is available here.

Felicity Porritt

Felicity Porritt is Head of Communications for the Institute. She works across the media relations and public affairs briefs. Former BBC Journalist, Which? campaigner and award winning communications strategist, Felicity Porritt has worked with Michael Marmot for the last four years. She launched Fair Society, Healthy Lives February 2010 and the World Health Organization's Commission on the Social Determinants of Health final report, which won Communique's Best International Media Relations Campaign 'highly commended'. Felicity also drew up and managed the communications strategy behind the headline hitting coverage of the World Cancer Research Fund's landmark report on cancer prevention in November 2007. The launch won 'Best Healthcare Campaign' from the Chartered Institute of Public Relations in 2008. Felicity holds a BA in Politics and Economics from Loughborough University, and an MSc in Nutrition, Physical Activity and Public Health from Bristol University

Carolyn Stephens

Carolyn Stephens is Professor of Ecology and Global Health of the National University of Tucumán (UNT), based in Argentina, and she joined the IHE as UCL Honorary Professor of Ecology & Global Health Equity in 2012, to support the international development of the IHE network.    She is an environmental and social epidemiologist working on health equity, environmental sustainability and human rights.  She is Director of the Amazonia-Yungas Observatory of Biodiversity, Indigenous Health and Equity.   She has worked for over 25 years with low-income communities in Asia, Africa and Latin America, and has advised UN agencies, national governments and NGOs on health equity, rights and environmental sustainability.   She holds the Royal Society Kohn award for science communication, and is on the editorial board of 6 international journals.