Neil Arya MD CCFP FCFP D Litt (www.neilarya.com)is a family physician, founder Director of the Kitchener/Waterloo Refugee Health Clinic and a Fellow at the Balsillie School for International Affairs. He is Assistant Clinical Professor Family Medicine (part-time) McMaster University and Adjunct Professor School of Public Health Sciences University of Waterloo; Dr. Arya has taught, lectured, written and participated in research on- refugee health issues, Peace through Health and Global Health around the world. He is President of PEGASUS Institute (https://pegasusinstitute.ca/), has edited four books. Dr. Arya was founding Director of the Global Health Office at Western University (2009-2013) and Scholar in Residence and Fellow at the International Migration Research Centre at Wilfrid Laurier University (2018-2020). He remains Assistant Clinical Professor in Family Medicine at McMaster University. Dr. Arya has been recognized by the community, colleagues and academic including with the College of Family Physicians of Canada Geeta Gupta Award for Equity and Diversity (2009) .DLitt. (Honorary) Wilfrid Laurier University and mid-Career Award in International Health from the American Public Health Association (2011) and the College of Family Physicians Canada (CFPC) Award of Excellence (2013).

Dr Sahar Bahadi is a pediatrician originally from Aleppo, Syria where she worked in multiple hospitals over a 25 year period, including the Red Crescent Hospital for children, while running her own private clinic. In addition, she volunteered for many years in the Red Crescent Clinic for cerebral palsy and handicapped children, where she gave clinical care and lectures on child health to parents through UNICEF. In 1991, Dr. Bahadi completed a postgraduate study in the history of medicine and contributed to the writing of an encyclopedia of famous Arab and Muslim scholars. Although she worked very hard, her work was rewarding and safe.

At the beginning of the Syrian war in 2011, she received death threats to herself and her family, and left Syria to start a new life in Canada. On July 27 th 2013 her vision of a safe, new life were shattered when she received news of the death of her son, Sammy Yatim. A policeman had tasered and shot Sammy nine times on a Toronto streetcar. Sammy Yatim is Canada’s George Floyd. Sammy’s death mobilized a nation and led to numerous protests against police brutality. The police officer was charged with murder, which represents the only case in Canadian history of police officer being jailed for murder. Sammy’s death resulted in 84 recommendations related to the training of police.

While Dr. Bahadi has experienced unimaginable pain due to the loss of her son, and her country, she continued to volunteer through the international organization Woman and Health Alliance (WAHA) to treat Syrian children in refugee camps in Greece and Lebanon. In Canada she has been volunteering with the Arab Community Centre of Toronto and, more recently, with Dr. Banerji at the COSTI pediatric clinic.

Dr. Anna Banerji is a pediatrician, infectious/tropical disease specialist, public health specialist, and human rights advocate. She is a compassionate humanitarian where equity, diversity and social justice has been central throughout her professional career and personal life. As an educator, researcher and activist, she has focused on refugee and Indigenous populations.

Dr. Banerji, a pioneer in refugee health, is the founder of the North American Refugee Health Conference (NARHC) which occurs in Canada on alternative years. It has become the largest academic meeting on refugee health globally. She is the founding Executive Director for the North American Refugee Health Conference Incorporated. She has been working with refugee children for most of her career and created the COSTI Pediatric clinic where she screens most of the refugee children coming to Toronto. When the Syrians arrived in 2016, she was the first healthcare provider onsite at the hotel and currently is assessing Afghan children at the airport hotels.

Dr. Banerji has been working with Indigenous communities for almost 30 years, as a strong ally and advocate for Indigenous peoples. She has travelled to numerous Indigenous communities across Canada in various capacities. She has published landmark research on respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) documenting that Inuit babies have the highest admissions for RSV globally and has been advocating for health equity including access to the RSV vaccine for term Inuit babies. Dr. Banerji was successful in advocating for more resources for Indigenous communities to fight COVID-19 through petitions which resulted in an additional $305 million dollars, and Indigenous Services implemented most of her recommendations for the management of COVID-19 in Indigenous communities.

In 2014 Dr. Banerji founded the Indigenous Health Conference, the largest academic event in Canada discussing diverse aspects of Indigenous Health. She was a public health consultant for the COVID-19 task force for Nishnawabe Aski Nation which represents 49 First Nations communities in Northern Ontario. When the COVID-19 vaccine became available, she spent five weeks in remote Northern fly communities to vaccinate First Nations Youth.

Dr. Banerji has travelled extensively around the world including working in a field hospital with the Canadian Red Cross in Haiti for a month, soon after the 2010 earthquake. She has given thousands of media interviews and invited lectures, mostly advocating for health equity. She was a trusted voice in the media during COVID-19 with her candor, knowledge and experience, focusing on disadvantaged and under-served populations including: CBC The National, BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera and the Washington Post. She is currently an expert medical columnist for the CBC Syndication for radio stations across Canada.

She has won several awards including: the Dr. Peter Henderson Bryce Award (2019) for her advocacy with Indigenous children, Ontario Pediatrician of the Year (2022) and was inaugurated into the Order of Ontario in 2012.

Dr. Diaz is a board-certified General Internist practicing primary care in New York City. She is the Internal Medicine Medical Director at the Charles Rangel Community Health Center in Harlem, the Medical Director for the Adult CHW Program at New York Presbyterian's Center for Community Health Navigation, and an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Columbia University Medical Center. She grew up in Miami, Florida, where she was raised by her immigrant grandparents. She attended Williams College, received her MD/MPH from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, and completed her residency training in Primary Care and Social Internal Medicine at Montefiore Medical Center/Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Dr. Diaz’s work focuses on community-engaged approaches to address immigrant health inequities resulting from immigration enforcement policies. As a resident, Dr. Diaz joined a network of volunteer clinicians visiting immigration prisons to evaluate detained immigrants with serious medical conditions to document unmet medical needs. This led to several collaborative research projects evaluating the health impacts of immigration detention filling critical gaps in the literature. Bearing witness to the many harms detained immigrants experienced influenced her in publishing several opinion pieces in the lay media on the public health hazards of immigration detention. She has collaborated with other medical and legal experts to develop best practices in the medical evaluation of individuals in immigration detention, and has trained dozens of residents and medical students. Dr. Diaz is committed to using her voice as a physician researcher to uplift human rights, health justice, and equity.

Dr. Vanig Garabedian moved with his family to Canada from Syria in December 2015 as a refugee.

In Syria, he worked as an obstetrician-gynecologist for 15 plus years including 4 years in a war zone. He was the medical director of the largest hospital in the Middle East. Dr. Garabedian practiced in both public and private hospitals and taught in an obstetrician-gynecologist residency program and nursing school. He completed his medical training at Tishreen University. This includes his obstetrician-gynecologist residency in Damascus and his master’s degree in obstetrics-gynecology (board certified from Syrian Board of Medical Specialties). He is a registered physician in Canada.

Dr. Garabedian is passionate to assist people integrating into Canada and providing support in times of crisis. He has made numerous contributions in many refugee and newcomer communities and organizations. Among them: The Together Project, TRIEC, Woodgreen Immigrant Services and Access Centre.

He is married and has 3 daughters. His favourite activity is spending time with family. His favourite food is Syrian kabab.

Fardous Hosseiny (he/him) is the President and CEO at the Atlas Institute for Veterans and Families (formerly the Centre of Excellence on PTSD), located at the Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre in Ottawa.

Before coming to Atlas, Fardous was most recently the interim National Chief Executive Officer and the National Director of Research and Public Policy, at the Canadian Mental Health Association.

His research work focuses on strategic policy issues related to mental health system transformation, parity legislation, Veteran and their Families mental health, substance use and addiction and mental health for newcomers and underrepresented groups.

Fardous is also a frequent commentator on these issues for Global News, CBC, CTV News, The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star, among others.

Fardous was a part of the Canadian delegation to the 73rd Session of the United Nations General Assembly and played a role in the development of the first ever United Nations event dedicated to mental health.

Fardous also serves on many national and international committees, including as a member of the Five Eyes Mental Health Research and Innovation Collaboration, an executive advisor on the Global Alliance for Mental Health Advocates (GAMHA), and past co-chair for the Canadian Alliance for Mental Illness and Mental Health (CAMIMH) and Canadians for Equitable Access to Depression Medication (CEADM).

Fardous is a clinical investigator at the University of Ottawa Institute of Mental Health Research.

Fardous completed a Master of Science with a focus on the neuroscience of addiction and a BSc Honours, both at the University of Toronto. He also holds a Certified Health Executive (CHE) designation from the Canadian College of Health Leaders.

Fardous is on the Board of Directors – Canadian Juries Commission and Renascent Addiction Treatment Centre.

Dr. Kratz is an Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine, board-certified in Addiction Medicine and Internal Medicine. He is the Medical Lead for Targeted Outreach in the NewYork-Presbyterian Division of Community and Population Health and where he leads hospital initiatives to support newly-arrived immigrants to New York City. He is the Social Determinants of Health Champion for Columbia University Irving Medical Center, and is the founding Medical Director of the TRANSiT (“Therapeutic Resources and Assistance in Navigation to Services while in Transition”) program at NewYork-Presbyterian, a substance use bridge clinic and graduate medical education teaching site focused on low-barrier access to treatment for substance use disorders. He is a member of the steering committee of the New York Lawyers for the Public Interest (NYLPI) Medical Provider Network, a network of over 240 volunteer medical professionals who review medical records, visit immigration detention facilities, provide testimony and write advocacy letters supporting individuals in immigration proceedings. His interests include use of community engagement approaches to serve marginalized populations, implementation of low-barrier access models in the substance use disorder care continuum, community-medical partnerships, and community-based participatory research. He is the former medical director of the NewYork-Presbyterian Health Home program as well as the NYP Community Health Worker program, and was the recipient of the 2023 Advocacy Award from the New York Chapter of the American College of Physicians.

Glen, an engineer by training, worked for over 30 years with a private Canadian Engineering, Procurement, Construction Management (EPCM) company. For the last 20 years, he has been managing all aspects of technology projects (i.e., scope, schedule, budget, risk) to support the execution of large EPCM projects.

He is a licensed member of Professional Engineers Ontario and holds the Project Management Institute of Project Management Professional (PMP) accreditation.

Glen brings valuable, transferrable skills to the NARHC Inc. board of directors. In addition to managing people and projects, Glen has expertise in identifying requirements, implementing technology and collecting and analyzing data.

Glen is enjoying a physically active retirement and is always seeking opportunities to give back to his community.

Zeeshan is a project manager who developed and has been managing the Migration and Public Health Knowledge Translation project stream at the National Collaborating Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCCID). Numerous knowledge mobilization activities and resources were developed by Mr. Qadar including webinars, podcasts, case studies and conference presentations (Canadian Public Health Association 2016 and 2018, North American Refugee Health Conference 2017, 2018, 2019).

Currently, he is managing COVID-19 response and has been involved as co-principal investigator on a project looking at the role of communication strategies and media discourse in shaping psychological and behavioral response to the COVID-19 outbreak, comparing Canada, Hong Kong and the Philippines. He’s also studying ethical frameworks and models for unproven treatments during a pandemic in Canada and around the world. Zeeshan also developed a repository for public health resources related to COVID-19 created by provinces and territories in various languages.

He also contributes behind the scenes to NCCID’s weekly “Infectious Questions” podcast, which covers issues like preparedness in nursing homes and stigma and discrimination. He is looking into a project related to use of big data in public health surveillance and mathematical modeling in infectious diseases public health.

MD, MSc., FRCPC., D.Sc (Hons) Addis Ababa University (AAU), Professor in the Department of Psychiatry, University of Toronto (UofT), and psychoanalyst. Staff psychiatrist at Mount Sinai Hospital, Toronto; at the Canadian Center for Victims of Torture for refugee mental health; and the clinic for indigenous mental health, with the Community Mental Health Program and Addictions Program; a Division of Weeneebayko Area Health Authority.

Dr. Umashanie Reddy is the National Secretariat Director of the Refugee Resettlement Program. Umashanie works collaboratively with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) and the resettlement service providers nationally to support the resettlement and integration of government-assisted refugees.

Her experience spans over 2 countries and 3.5 decades working with equity seeking populations in diverse diasporas in multisectoral contexts in South Africa and Canada. In 2024 Umashanie obtained her doctorate in education from the University of Western Ontario. Her experience in health emanates from South Africa and includes her work on the enactment of the first HIV Aids library in Southern Africa at the Nelson R. Mandela School of Medicine and later in Canada as the Tom Baker cancer librarian at the Tom Baker Cancer Centre, University of Calgary.

From a personal perspective Umashanie is a stage IV cancer survivor of 34 years. She is the recipient of several awards for her service to humanity including, Immigrants of Distinctions, RBC Top 25 Canadian Immigrants, Graduate of the Last Decade, and the Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal.

Rasha Shawaf is a Clinical Fellow at McMaster University specializing in the field of Infectious Diseases. I am particularly interested in Global Health and Refugee Health.

Shelina Shivji is a creative Change Facilitator. Among other credentials from several accredited Canadian institutions, she holds a Masters in Conflict Analysis and Management with a concentration in Community and Schools.

For past 30 plus years, through multiple volunteer and professional roles, Shelina has had extensive practice in the areas of Human Empowerment and Social Development. Her work ethic is grounded in the approach of multidisciplinary/integrated service delivery models.

Shelina is currently employed with the Ministry of Solicitor General Ontario, in the Community Service Sector.

She recently completed an eight-year term as a Board Director at TNO - The Neighbourhood Organization, five of which were as Board Chair/President.

TNO is a community-based, multi location, multi-service agency in Ontario, Canada, since 1985. Providing Social Services, as well as primary care, and related linkages for refugees and newcomers to Canada are integral components of this organizations service delivery model.

During her tenure as the Board Chair/President from 2018 – 2023, Shelina led the organization through multiple significant milestones. Some of these include, serving the needs of multiple communities through the Covid –19 pandemic. As well as, responding to and serving the needs that arose with the arrival and settlement of refugees from Afghanistan and Ukraine.

After training as a nurse in Switzerland, Assunta came to Canada in 1969 where she met Dr. Vincenzo Marcolongo. At his request, she began working for International Association for Medical Assistance to Travellers (IAMAT). IAMAT is a division of the Foundation for the Support of International Medical Training (Canada).

She helped develop the first world immunization chart and world malaria risk chart, the world’s first publications detailing vaccination recommendations and malaria prophylaxis for all countries. These unique publications set the standard for health advice for travellers everywhere. Other publications followed, such as the traveller clinical record, whitepapers and charts on schistosomiasis, chagas and travel health tipsheets and guides.

For several years, Assunta has been the director of IAMAT. She is involved and supports all aspects of travel medicine, immigration and refugee health.