Dr. Anarfi Asamoa-Baah

Senior Policy Advisor, Office of the Director-General The Director-General of the World Health Organization, Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, appointed Doctor Anarfi Asamoa-Baah to the Office of the Director- General as a senior policy advisor. This office will support the daily work of the Director General and help her keep in constant touch with the clusters at headquarters as well as with regional offices and Member States through their missions in Geneva. Dr Asamoa-Baah brings extensive experience from the health sector in Ghana.

Dr Asamoa-Baah was born in Ghana in 1958.

At the time of his appointment, Dr Asamoa-Baah was Director of Medical Services in the Ministry of Health, Ghana. He was the Director of the Policy, Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation Division at the Ministry of Health in Ghana.

He brings with him considerable experience in health sector development, reform and planning.

He initially trained as a doctor with special interest in paediatrics. Whilst working as a doctor in charge of a small 150 bed mission hospital in rural Ghana, he developed an interest in public health and working with poor communities. He became a District Medical Officer and within two years was appointed as Deputy Director of Health Services in charge of Communicable Disease in the most populated region/province of Ghana.

In the late 1980's, Dr Asamoa-Baah left Ghana for further studies in Britain and the USA where he obtained postgraduate qualifications in community health, health planning, health economics and health policy analysis. He returned to Ghana after a brief period of teaching at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine in the UK and was appointed Director of the newly created Division for Policy, Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation at the Ministry of Health. He has been very instrumental in reforms in the health sector, in the civil service and in budget and financial systems in the winder public service in Ghana. He has served on a number of intersectoral committees and taught part-time at the Ghana Medical School and the School of Public Health.

He has been very active in WHO working both up to regional and global levels and has served on a number of committees and working groups. At the moment, Dr Asamoa-Baah is a member of the Scientific Technical Advisory Committee of the Special Programme on Tropical Disease Research, a member of the Expert Advisory Committee on the Onchocerciasis Control Programme, an expert on the Advisory Committee on Health Systems Development and a member of the Global Forum on Health Sector Reform. He was also the chair of the Task Force on Programmes and Platform in Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland's Transition Team.

Dr Asamoa-Baah is married with two children.