Barbara Profeta has twenty years of overseas experience in humanitarian and development work, across a variety of positions and organisations, including the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement, the UN family, NGO and private consulting firms. She has been managing offices and programmes in a dozen of different countries on four continents, with a major focus on fragile and conflict-affected environments. Holder of a PhD on International Public Health and Policy at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, since 2008 Barbara has engaged in programmatic and advocacy work related to the strengthening of distressed health systems and linking research and operations. Barbara is currently working as Senior Health Advisor for Global Programme Health and Eastern Cooperation Domain at the Swiss Development Cooperation agency. In parallel, she is a board member of the Thematic Working Group on Fragile and Conflict Affected States and an advisory group member of the Private Sector Engagement Thematic Working Group attached to the Health Systems Global research network. Since 2021, she is also a Honorary affiliate at the Institute of Development Studies (UK) and Sussex University. Main areas of interest: Health systems’ governance, distressed health systems, health systems’ redesign, mixed health systems, private sector in health, informal economies in the health sector, role of China in global health, role and future of the aid industry, local solutions, south-south partnerships in development, equity in research.