Debrework Zewdie,

Dr. Debrework Zewdie, Director, Global HIV/AIDS Program, the World Bank, has spent the last 20 years fighting HIV/AIDS as a scientist, strategist, manager, advocate and activist. Her dedication and leadership have helped transform the response to the epidemic at the international, regional, national and community levels. She has been a supportive partner with UNAIDS since its inception, working closely with the Executive Director to expand political and financial commitment to HIV prevention, care and treatment around the world.

Dr. Zewdie received her Ph.D. in from the University of London and was a Senior MacArthur Fellow at Harvard University's School of Population and Development Studies. She has published numerous journal articles and book chapters on a variety of subjects.

Dr. Zewdie is currently Director of the World Bank’s Global HIV/AIDS Program, where she provides overall strategic and technical leadership to the Bank’s AIDS efforts. She serves as the Bank’s UNAIDS Global Coordinator and represents the institution as a member of the UNAIDS Program Coordinating Board, contributing to the development and implementation of global HIV policies and strategies. Under her stewardship, the Bank’s AIDS portfolio has expanded dramatically. She created and led the AIDS Campaign Team for Africa (ACTafrica), which developed the strategy for Intensifying Action against HIV/AIDS in Africa. This groundbreaking strategy resulted in the Multi-country AIDS Program for Africa, which committed US$1 billion to support AIDS programs in 35 countries, at a time when international funding to combat the epidemic was tragically low. The MAP fundamentally changed the scope of the World Bank AIDS response, becoming the first multi-sectoral program to provide civil society and the private sector with direct and long-term financing to support HIV programs of national scale.

Prior to joining the World Bank, Dr. Zewdie was Deputy Director of the Africa Region for the AIDS Control and Prevention project (AIDSCAP) of Family Health International, the largest global AIDS program at that time. There she worked at the regional level to strengthen program implementation in 17 African countries. In her home country of Ethiopia, Dr Zewdie had a rich career as a researcher, Associate Professor of Immunology, and program manager on a range of public health challenges. She served as Deputy Director and Acting Director of the National Research Institute of Health, established and headed the National Referral Laboratory for AIDS in Ethiopia, and served as Program Manager of Ethiopia's AIDS/STD Prevention and Control Program. In 1985, she identified the first HIV- positive Ethiopian with a team of physicians. She continues to serve on several Boards, including the International AIDS Society. Dr. Zewdie is a founding vice president of the Society for Women and AIDS in Africa, where she brought to bear her perspectives as an African woman.

In addition to UNAIDS and the World Bank, Dr. Zewdie has deep working knowledge of national AIDS programs, the Global Fund for AIDS, and , bilateral donors such as PEPFAR and DFID, and civil society organizations. In November 2007, on the request of the GFATM Executive Director, Dr. Zewdie was seconded to GFATM to lead its Operations Department, the institution’s largest unit with two-thirds of total global staff. Dr. Zewdie was selected on the basis of her track record establishing and implementing AIDS programs at the international, regional and country levels. In her seven-month secondment at GFATM, Dr. Zewdie

restructured the Operations Department, put needed systems in place and built teams to help the Fund achieve its mandate.

Having spent the last twenty years responding to the HIV/AIDS epidemics as a scientist, academic, manager and advocate, Dr. Zewdie is keenly aware of the tremendous achievements that have been made in the global response to HIV/AIDS, and specifically by UNAIDS. Nevertheless, she sees the HIV epidemics as a long-term development challenge that will continue to require predictable financing and sustainable capacity building, coupled with advances in science and technology. Equally key is the need to mount amore robust, culturally sensitive and politically supported. Prevention program to break the back of both generalized and concentrated epidemics.