Dr. Revati Phalkey is the newly appointed Director of the United Nations University Institute for Global Health (UNU-IIGH).
Dr. Phalkey comes to UNU from Save the Children International, where she was the Global Director for Health and Nutrition. In this role, she was responsible for the quality and impact of health, nutrition, and water, sanitation and hygiene programmes across 66 countries in development contexts and 54 countries in humanitarian settings. Overseeing a program portfolio exceeding US$350 million/year, she successfully implemented the organisation’s 2022-2024 ambitions.
Dr. Phalkey brings robust experience with convening technical experts and strategic implementation partners to build consensus on key global health policy issues.
Before joining Save the Children International, Dr. Phalkey was Head of Climate Change and Health at the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), where she co-led the 4th assessment of the health impacts of climate change in the UK. Working across departments within the UK Government, she led UKHSA’s input to the design of the COP26 Health Programme, which was instrumental in setting up the momentum for health within UNFCCC processes. She served as an invited Steering Committee member for the first ever Health Day at COP28.
Dr. Phalkey is Honorary Associate Professor for Global Health at the Heidelberg Institute for Global Health (HIGH), Germany, and at the University of Nottingham, UK. As a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, UK, Dr. Phalkey brings strong mentoring and capacity strengthening expertise. As an academic, she has served in various roles in the UK and in Germany delivering interdisciplinary, multi-country, multi-site implementation research projects on a range of global health topics in West, East and Southern Africa, South and Central Asia, and Europe.