Zsuzsanna Jakab nominated for second term as WHO Regional Director for Europe

Copenhagen, 16 September 2014

Ms Zsuzsanna Jakab has been nominated for a second five-year term as the Regional Director of the European Region of the World Health Organization (WHO) by the WHO Regional Committee for Europe. The Regional Committee is WHO’s governing body for the European Region, and comprises health ministers from the Region’s 53 Member States. The nomination will be submitted to the session of the WHO Executive Board to be held in January 2015 in Geneva, Switzerland. The Board is expected to confirm the nomination, after which Ms Jakab will begin a second term in office on 1 February 2015.

Ms Jakab, a Hungarian national and the first representative of Hungary to lead a WHO region, announced earlier this year that she would run for a second term. No other proposals of candidates were submitted.

Before taking over leadership of the WHO Regional Office for Europe in 2010, Ms Jakab served as the founding Director of the European Union’s European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) in Stockholm, Sweden. During Ms Jakab’s first term as Regional Director, she focused on such tasks as developing the European policy for health and well-being, Health 2020; intensifying collaboration with Member States; and strengthening the Regional Office as an evidence-based centre of excellence in health policy and public health.

Over the past four years, the WHO European Region has had particular success in supporting countries in developing and promoting strategies and policies on health inequities and the social determinants of health, tackling the epidemic of chronic diseases, promoting health throughout life, reforming health systems and dealing with communicable diseases. Further, the Region has contributed to global progress in, for example, pursuing the health-related Millennium Development Goals, addressing emerging health threats and tackling vaccine-preventable diseases, AIDS and tuberculosis.

In her second mandate, Ms Jakab will give priority to linking health to sustainable development in order to ensure greater equity in health in the European Region. On accepting the nomination, she said, “It’s not only about making health better; it’s about ensuring more equitable and sustainable health for Europe!”

The WHO Regional Office for Europe’s website offers further information on Ms Jakab , and the 2014 Regional Committee session. 

For further information, CV and photo, contact:

Liuba Negru
Media Relations Officer
WHO Regional Office for Europe
UN City, Marmorvej 51
2100 Copenhagen Ø, Denmark
Tel.: +45 45 33 68 37, +45 20 45 92 74 (mobile)
Email: lne@euro.who.int