About Us

The Institute of Health Equity Team

Professor Sir Michael Marmot 
Professor Sir Michael Marmot
Professor Sir Michael Marmot is the Director of the Institute of Health Equity. 

More information about Michael

 

 

Dr Jessica Allen 
Dr Jessica Allen
Deputy Director

Jessica’s main activities are in working to embed a social determinants approach to health inequalities in England and globally. She led work on the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Region Commission on the Social Determinants of Health (published March 2021), the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) Commission on Equity and Health Inequalities in the Americas and the Review of Social Determinants of Health and the Health Divide in the WHO European Region.  She was previously Project Director of the Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England post-2010 (the Marmot Review) and in February 2020, co-authored the Marmot Review 10 Years On report and in December 2020 led work on Build Back Fairer: the COVID-19 Marmot review. 

Jessica has worked closely with international organisations, national and local governments, third sector organisations and the NHS and published widely on social determinants of health. She is a member of several advisory groups in England and internationally.   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.

@Jessjallen

Professor Peter Goldblatt 
Professor Peter Goldblatt
Senior Advisor
 

As well as his role in the Institute of Health Equity, Peter Goldblatt is a statistical advisor to the UK Department of Health and Social Care and an expert advisor to WHO European Office. His main activities are in the field of measurement and monitoring and contributing to European and other international project to review and monitor the social determinants of health. He was previously the Chief Medical Statistician at the UK Office for National Statistics (ONS). He was seconded from ONS to UCL for the duration of the Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England post-2010 (the Marmot Review). Following this review, he co-ordinated reviews of health inequalities in the WHO European Region, for WHO, and a review of health inequalities in European, for the European Commission (EC). He has subsequently contributed to several other projects, including European Parliament pilot projects, an EC project on drivers of health inequality, a UNDP project on inequalities in health and its determinants, , a review of equity and health inequalities in the Americas, a review of 10 years on since the Marmot Review, a review of non-communicable diseases in Belgium, reviews of health inequalities in Norway and in local areas in England and several projects on the unequal impact of COVID-19 and its containment measures.

 
Dr. Angela Donkin 
Dr. Angela Donkin
Dr Angela Donkin is rejoining IHE after working at the National Foundation for Educational Research for the last five years as their Chief Social Scientist. Angela has a wealth of experience in managing research, evaluation and analysis projects across a number of social policy areas, but has particularly deep knowledge relating to inequities arising from early years, education, and work. Angela was at IHE prior to NFER for five years and before that led the secretariat for the Graham Allen Review, the Cross departmental health work and wellbeing unit at the Department of Work and Pensions, and also worked on pension policy. Angela also worked at ONS on inequalities in life expectancy. 
Dr Ruth Bell 
Dr Ruth Bell
Senior Advisor at the UCL Institute of Health Equity and Principal Research Fellow in the Department of Epidemiology & Public Health at UCL

Ruth’s main activities are in working to provide evidence and strategic policy advice for integrated action across sectors to tackle health inequalities. She has a particular interest in the social determinants of non-communicable diseases. She currently leads work to evaluate innovative interventions within two HORIZON 2020 projects: INHERIT and Cities-4-People. Ruth has developed evidence-based reports for UNDP, WHO, UNICEF, the UK Department for International Development and Public Health England. Ruth leads a Masters level taught module on the social determinants of health at UCL, and the annual UCL Health and Society Summer School.

Dr Tammy Boyce 
Dr Tammy Boyce
Senior Research Associate

 

Tammy’s main activities are collating and analysing data on the social determinants of health inequalities and providing evidence on policies and programmes across sectors which aim to reduce health inequalities. She is co-author of both the Marmot Review 10 Years On and the 2010 Marmot Review as well as: Build Back Fairer in Greater Manchester; Build Back Fairer: Achieving Health Equity in the Eastern Mediterranean Region and Sustainable Health Equity: Achieving a Net-Zero UK.

Tammy has worked with a number of international organisations, national and local governments and voluntary/third sector organisations. Prior to her work at the Institute of Health Equity, she worked for organisations including the WHO Regional Office for Europe and the Kings Fund. She has published widely on issues relating to health and social care policy and the social determinants of health.

 

Felicity Porritt 
Felicity Porritt

Head of Communications

Felicity works across communications, strategy and advocacy, including media relations. Former BBC Journalist, Which? campaigner and award winning communications strategist, Felicity Porritt has worked with Michael Marmot since 2007. 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'. In February 2020, she co-ordinated the launch of the Health Equity in England: Marmot Review 10 Years On report.

Felicity also works remotely as an advocacy and strategy consultant within WHO's Equity and Health Team, Department of Social Determinants of Health, Geneva. Prior to working at IHE, Felicity 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.

Luke Beswick 
Luke Beswick
Finance and Project Coordinator

Luke manages all finances and budgets for 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. 

  

 

Jamaica Noferini 
Jamaica Noferini

Researcher

Jamaica was born and raised in beautiful Florence, Italy, and moved to London in 2015 for University. She graduated in 2018 from Queen Mary University of London with a BA in International Relations and went straight into an MSc in Human Rights at the London School of Economics. Before her Master's graduation she was selected for an internship at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon in Communications and Public Information and in January 2022 Jamaica joined the team at the IHE as a researcher. She is currently working on a WHO evidence review on the interventions on the social determinants of health, as well as leading two evidence reviews on Structural Racism for the GLA.

Alison Biedron 
Alison Biedron

Health Equity Network Coordinator, Researcher and Communications Administrator

Alison holds a BA Hons. from NYU in Gender and Sexuality Studies with concentrations in Global Public Health and Science in Society. She recently completed the MSc in Global Health and Development at UCL focussing on HIV rates amongst border-crossing female migrants into South Africa.

Lorenzo Lionello 
Lorenzo Lionello
Lorenzo is a social epidemiologist who's work mainly focuses on the social determinants of health and the health equity gap in Europe. He holds an MSc in Global Population Health from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and has previously collaborated with the WHO European Office, the Institut national d'études démographiques (INED), and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Currently, he also works for Sciensano and is a researcher for RESISTIRÉ, a HORIZION 2020 project investigating inequalities created by the COVID-19 pandemic. He is passionate about data analysis and visualization, policy research, and intersectional analysis.
 
Scarlet Willis 
Scarlet Willis
Executive Assistant to Professor Sir Michael Marmot and Researcher
 

Scarlet works as Executive Assistant to Professor Sir Michael Marmot. She also works as a Research Assistant with the IHE team. She has a BA in Philosophy from University College London. 

Alan Higgins 
Alan Higgins

Health Equity Network Lead

Alan has extensive experience working as a Director of Public Health in both the NHS and local government. He was Director of Public Health in Oldham from 2002 to 2018, leading the transition of public health from the NHS into local government and in the development of the Greater Manchester devolved public health programme. He is now working as an independent expert on public health with a focus on working across whole systems, wellbeing economics, applying understanding of complexity and systems leadership and strategic analysis and planning.

After two years working in Liverpool City Region to develop the Wealth and Wellbeing Programme Alan worked during the pandemic as a Programme Director for NW PHE/UKHSA. Since April 2022 Alan has been working part-time with the Institute of Health Equity as co lead of the Health Equity Network and with Cheshire and Mersey Public Health Network as strategic lead on implementation of the All Together Fairer programme.

Antia Castedo 
Antia Castedo

Senior Researcher

Antia is interested in looking at how public policies can be used to reduce health inequalities by acting on the social determinants of health. She is also keen on increasing public understanding and generating awareness of inequalities in health.

Since joining the IHE, Antia has co-authored a Rapid review of inequalities in health and wellbeing in Norway since 2014 and a report on Health inequalities in Hong Kong: A Lifecourse Approach. She previously worked as a researcher focusing on employment-related health inequalities for the WHO Commission on Social Determinants of Health and has consulted for the Health Promotion and Social Determinants of Health Unit at the Pan American Health Organization.

Antia is also a former BBC journalist and holds a degree in Political Science.

Sarah Martin 
Sarah Martin

 Sarah is a Health Economist and researcher, with experience working across West Africa and the European region. She holds an MSc in Health Economics from the University of York and has previously consulted for the WHO European Region on the Social Determinants of Health and Health Equity (SDH/HE) Programme. As part of the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) fellowship scheme, she spent 3 years working as a technical advisor to the National Primary Health Care Development Agency in Nigeria supporting the design, implementation, and evaluation of innovative health financing projects and health systems strengthening initiatives. She is passionate about global health, health equity and research for policy.