2024 Lead Fellows
Wanza Mbole
DSL, MBA, BSc
– Wanza Mbole
Wanza Mbole is an inclusive finance specialist with over 20 years in facilitating and advocating for finance policy and financial solutions that help to meet the needs of women and households and small businesses. In her role as a Senior economic inclusion advisor in FSD Kenya, she is leading work on health finance policy and better health financial solutions as means to improving access to better quality care. She is particularly passionate about enhancing women’s and low-income households’ resilience to health shocks in her country, Kenya, where out of pocket expenditure has consistently accounted for at least 25% of the total health budget. Wanza is currently leading research on women’s and households’ health needs, health seeking behavior and access to care, health financing and other coping mechanisms and the opportunity costs and using the insights to inform health finance. Understanding these issues is crucial as Kenya starts to implement the new social health insurance policy which is seen as the route to Universal Health Coverage. She is also spearheading a maternal and neonatal value-based care pilot program which holds promise for transforming how health is financed so as to deliver greater value for money and health outcomes. She is an executive coach and mentor to several young female leaders.
Jalikatu Mustapha
MMed, MSc, BMBS
“I have been a leader since 2019 yet have never been taught to lead. I have seen all too often the effects of poor leadership and want to avoid these mistakes. As a government minister, I have reached a position where I can do some real good for my country and I am confident that this fellowship would give me the right skills to do this. For me, this fellowship will be a pathway to achieve my main goal: to be an effective global health leader and to coach and mentor the next generation of global health leaders from within and outside Sierra Leone.”
– Jalikatu Mustapha
Dr. Jalikatu Mustapha was appointed as the Deputy Minister of Health Ⅱ by the President of Sierra Leone in July 2023. She oversees a large portfolio which includes clinical and laboratory services; ambulance and referral networks; sexual, reproductive, maternal, child and adolescent health; mental health and substance abuse; climate change and health; and public private partnerships for health.
Dr. Mustapha leads strategic efforts to strengthen Sierra Leone’s health systems and promote integrated approaches to climate health, sexual and reproductive health and child health. She coordinates and collaborates with government agencies, local and international non-governmental organizations, civil societies, and other stakeholders to develop and implement policies and programs that prioritize prevention, promote healthy behaviors, and reduce maternal and child mortality, especially in the context of climate change.
She is also a practicing ophthalmologist, who led the National Eye Health Program from 2019-2023, where she focused on implementing blindness prevention campaigns. Her most successful campaign included mobile outreach services to hard-to-reach populations and gender-focused interventions to improve eye health for women and girls, which benefitted more than 100,000 people. Her work earned her the prestigious International Agency for Blindness Prevention (IAPB) Eye Health Hero Award in 2020 and an interview with Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
Dr. Mustapha is a public health leader and university lecturer with experience working in Sierra Leone, engaging in research, teaching and capacity-building activities, mentoring the next generation of healthcare professionals and fostering a culture of innovation and excellence in both clinical and public health practice.