Professor Sharon Friel

Sharon Friel is an ARC Laureate Fellow and Professor of Health Equity. She is Director of the Planetary Health Equity Hothouse, and the Australian Research Centre for Health Equity (ARCHE) at the School of Regulation and Global Governance (RegNet), Australian National University. She is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences Australia and the Academy of Health and Medical Sciences, and Principal Visiting Fellow at the United Nations University, International Institute for Global Health. Previously, she was Director of RegNet from 2014-2019, and Head of the Scientific Secretariat (University College London) of the World Health Organisation Commission on the Social Determinants of Health between 2005 and 2008. In 2014, her international peers voted her one of the world’s most influential female leaders in global health. Her interests are in the political economy of health equity; governance of the social, commercial and planetary determinants of health inequities; climate change, food systems, trade and investment. Her 2019 book “Climate Change and the People’s Health” highlights the importance of addressing the global consumptogenic system.