Session 3: Continuum of care: Emergency response and early care
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Tooling up to save lives: Blood pressure trial launches in Bunnings NSW
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Worlds Collide: Growing up in non-Western culture & effect on thinking about global health
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Veronica Le Nevez
Profile
Veronica Le Nevez is Head of Impact and Engagement Australia at The George Institute for Global Health, where she leads the Institute’s advocacy and policy engagement activities in Australia and the Pacific region to help increase the impact of the institute’s health and medical research. Programmes of activity include preventive health, food and nutrition, primary care, injury, better treatments for non-communicable diseases, women’s health and critical care, and others.
Veronica has spent her career in public policy, having worked extensively in the environment portfolio and in digital innovation. Prior to joining The George Institute, Veronica was General Manager Policy and Advocacy at the Royal Australasian College of Physicians, and held policy development and implementation roles at the University of Sydney. Veronica has a Bachelor of Science in Resource and Environmental Management, and a Master of Environmental Science from Macquarie University and is currently studying a Masters of Business Administration at the University of New South Wales.
Sarah Suwasrawala
Profile
Sarah Suwasrawala is a psychologist and public mental health researcher working at the intersection of women's health, mental health, and community-based care. She currently serves as a Research Fellow at The George Institute for Global Health in India, where she contributes to multidisciplinary research on women's health and well-being across diverse healthcare settings. She holds a Master's degree in Clinical Psychology and has extensive experience designing and implementing trauma-informed, rights-based psychosocial interventions with marginalised populations, particularly youth.
Her work is grounded in culturally responsive and equity-oriented approaches, with a focus on gender-based violence, mental health disparities, and strengthening accessible mental health services in low-resource contexts. She is particularly interested in integrating mental health within broader public health frameworks and advancing community-driven models of care that address the social determinants of health.
Preety R Rajbangshi
Profile
Preety R. Rajbangshi is a Senior Research Fellow at The George Institute for Global Health, India, where she leads India's Global Women's Health Programme. She holds a Master of Public Health from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, United States.
Her research focuses on women's health across the life course and strengthening health systems for primary care. With nearly two decades of experience as a researcher and practitioner, she has worked on maternal health, anaemia, and endometriosis. She has prior experience working with government health programmes at national and state levels in India.
Preety brings extensive field experience in community engagement with tribal communities, internally displaced populations, and women workers in tea plantations. Her work aims to address health inequities and generate practice-based evidence to inform action.
High blood pressure
High blood pressure (hypertension) is the leading preventable cause of death, driving millions of heart attacks, strokes and cases of dementia and kidney disease every year. It occurs when the pressure in the blood vessel walls is consistently too high and may be driven by behaviours we can change (e.g. diet, alcohol intake and inactivity) and factors we cannot (e.g. family history, age and ethnicity). Certain medical conditions may also increase the chance of developing high blood pressure, such as obesity, diabetes and kidney disease.
Despite the serious risks, high blood pressure is often overlooked. It’s called a ‘silent killer’ as there are usually no symptoms. Around 1.4 billion adults are living with high blood pressure globally - around three-quarters in low- and middle-income countries - yet an estimated 600 million people don’t even know they have it.
Without action, fewer than a quarter of people with high blood pressure will ever have it under control. This crisis is
Maarinke van der Meulen
Profile
Maarinke is the Program Lead for the Global Thought Leadership Program, in the Impact and Engagement team. She is an innovation specialist, translating research insights for different audiences into a range of formats and complimenting advocacy efforts on preventable disease and injury. Maarinke is particularly interested in finding links between silos, working across specialisations, and connecting people and ideas, joining skills and expertise to deliver strong outcomes.
Maarinke joined the George Institute in 2018, establishing activities such as data visualisation, interactive stories and podcasts. Since then, Maarinke has further developed The Global Thought Leadership program, designing the Emerging Thought Leader Program - a 6 month capacity strengthening program to train and coach early-mid career researchers and subject matter experts- as well as the Distinguished Fellow Program, engaging and collaborating on thought leadership activities with a network of renowned experts around the globe.
Prior to working at The George Institute, Maarinke worked in other technical industries, including medicines education, insurance, finance and IT. Maarinke has a Masters in International Law and International Relations, Graduate Certificate in Health Policy and Health Communications, and a Bachelor of Business with double major in Marketing and Management.