Abdallah Daar

Professor of Public Health Science and of Surgery , University of Toronto
Director of Ethics and Commercialization, McLaughlin-Rotman Centre for Global Health
Member, Ethics Committee, HUGO
Chair, Board of Advisors, UN University International Institute for Global Health
Chair, Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases

Email: a.daar@utotonto.ca
Webpage link: http://www.mcmm.ca/programs/ethics.htm

Professor Abdallah S Daar is Professor of Public Health Sciences and of Surgery at the University of Toronto. He is also Senior Scientist and Director of the Program on Ethics and Commercialization, McLaughlin-Rotman Centre for Global Health, University Health Network and University of Toronto.

His major research focus is on the use of life sciences to ameliorate global health inequities, with a particular focus on building scientific capacity and increasing innovation in developing countries, in addition to studying how technologies can be rapidly taken from “lab to village”.

His work has spanned biomedical sciences, surgery, organ transplantation, bioethics and global health. His major international awards include the Hunterian Professorship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England and the UNESCO Avicenna Prize for Ethics of Science. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the New York Academy of Sciences, the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences and of the Academy of Sciences of the Developing World (TWAS). He has published 5 books, and over 300 research articles and chapters in books. He has trained hundreds of graduate students.

Daar is a member of UNESCO’s International Bioethics Committee and the Ethics Committee of the Human Genome Organization. He was a member of the Africa Union High Level Panel on Modern Biotechnology, which published its seminal report, “Freedom to Innovate”, in 2007.

His recent accomplishments include work on the Grand Challenges in Global Health, and he led a global study of Grand Challenges in Chronic Non-Communicable Diseases. He has advised the UN Secretary General's Office, UNESCO, WHO, and the Government of Canada. He studied medicine at Makerere University, Uganda and University of London, before going to Oxford for residency and fellowship training and a doctorate in immunology. He was on the faculty of Oxford University before moving to the Middle East to help start two new medical schools. He moved to the University of Toronto in 2001.