Qatar Journal of Public Health
Editors-in-Chief
Sheikh Mohammed Hamad J. Al-Thani, PhD, Ministry of Public Health, Qatar
Dr. Mohammed Bin Hamad Bin J. Al-Thani has been the Director of Public Health at the Ministry of Public Health in the State of Qatar since 2008. Currently, he is the Director of Non-Communicable Diseases Prevention Programs, MOPH. Dr. Al-Thani has headed several national committees including chairing the National Preventive Health Committee. His other affiliations include being the Assistant Professor of Public Health (courtesy) at Weill Cornel Medical College, Qatar Executive Board Member, and Member of the Executive Board of Health Ministers’ Council, Gulf Collaboration Council (GCC) States. He has also participated in many research activities that have had a positive impact on public health programs in the region. Dr. Al-Thani graduated from the Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University (1998) and received an Arab fellowship in Community Medicine in 2006. He gained a Fellowship from the Faculty of Public Health in London in 2010 and obtained a Masters in Business Administration in 2014 from HEC Paris.
Elmobashar Abd Farag, PhD, Ministry of Public Health, Doha, Qatar
Dr Elmoubasher Farag is a senior infectious disease epidemiologist and the head of the Communicable Disease Control Programs at the Ministry of Public Health, Qatar. He is a country coordinator for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) project on Zoonotic Disease Integrated Action (ZODIAC). Dr Farag holds a PhD in Communicable Disease Surveillance and Control from the University of Gezira, Sudan and another PhD in Emerging Infectious Disease from Erasmus MC, Netherlands. Dr Farag is also a Fellow at the Faculty of Public Health, Royal College of Surgeon and Physicians FFPH (UK). Further, he was one of 10 international experts assigned by the WHO in 2021 to trace the origin of COVID-19. When MERS-CoV evolved in Qatar in 2012, Dr Farag led the field investigation to identify the source of the virus and its mode of transmission. Using the One Health approach, he managed to identify the source of MERS-CoV from dromedary camels, marking the first isolation of the novel virus from the animal kingdom. His subsequent epidemiological investigations helped determine the potential risk factors and the most-at-risk populations. Dr Farag’s efforts were crowned with ‘Doha Declaration on MERS-CoV and One Health’ and adopted by MERS-affected countries at the Regional workshop on MERS-CoV and One Health in 2015, Qatar. He led the investigation in Qatar for COVID-19 cases and uncovered the first COVID-19 cluster of cases among a group of migrant workers in March 2020. Dr Farag currently leads seven research grants on One Health. Author of over 150 publications. He serves as a scientific expert to develop both the WHO/EMRO Framework for Emerging Infectious Disease and One Health. Dr Farag’s research on “one health and emerging infections” was awarded the main prize of WHO’s Fifth meeting of the Eastern Mediterranean Acute Respiratory Infection Surveillance (EMARIS) network in 2019.
Managing Editor
Devendra Bansal, PhD, Ministry of Public Health, Doha, Qatar
Dr. Devendra Bansal is a public health scientist with 23 years of academic and professional experience. He has worked at institutions such as PGIMER in India, Institut Pasteur in France, and Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar. Currently, he is employed at the Ministry of Public Health in Qatar, where his research focuses on Epidemiology, One Health, antimicrobial resistance (AMR), and vector-borne diseases. Dr. Bansal has published over 70 articles in peer-reviewed journals and has received funding from agencies including the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), Institut Pasteur & Fondation des Treilles in Tourtour, France, Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF), Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC), and the World Health Organization (WHO).
Editorial Board
Senior Editors
Hadi M. Yassine, PhD, Qatar University, Qatar
Hadi Mohamad Yassine is an associate professor of infectious diseases and section head of research at the Qatar University Biomedical Research Center (BRC).His research and teaching experiences have been fostered by several years of intensive work at state-of-the-art and multi-disciplinary institutions. He has published over 200 articles, many of which are in top-tier scientific journals. He was named a highly cited researcher (top 0.1% worldwide) by Clarivate in 2021, 2022 and 2023. He received several awards in recognition of his work and contributed to seven patents on new designs of viral vaccines.
Laith Abu-Raddad, PhD, Weill Cornell Medicine, Qatar
Laith J. Abu-Raddad (Ph.D.) is a Professor of Population Health Sciences at Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar. His academic career is distinguished by numerous high-impact studies published in journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine, Science, and The Lancet. His research spans a spectrum of infectious diseases, including COVID-19, HIV, other sexually transmitted infections, hepatitis C virus, tuberculosis, and SARS.
Mohamed Ghaith Al-Kuwari, PhD, Primary Health Care Corporation, Qatar
Al-Kuwari is a Senior Consultant in Preventive Medicine and Executive Director of Strategy Planning and Health Intelligence at the Primary Health Care Corporation. Academically, he is a Professor of Community Medicine at the College of Medicine at Qatar University and a Trainer in Family and Community Medicine residency programs. He is also the former program director of the community medicine residency program. Prof. Al-Kuwari has over 100 scientific papers published in Preventive Medicine, Epidemiology, and Primary Healthcare.
Ivana Bozicevic, MD, WHO Collaborating Centre for HIV Strategic Information
Ivana Božičević (MD, MSc, DrPH) is a Professor of Public Health at the University of Zagreb School of Medicine in Croatia and serves as a director of the WHO Collaborating Centre for HIV Strategic Information. She holds a DrPH from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Her research interests are the epidemiology of HIV and STIs and the evaluation of interventions.
Associate Editors
Mohammed Nour, PhD, Ministry of Public Health, Doha, Qatar
Sayed Mohamed Himatt, PhD, EMPHNET, Jordan
Khalid Hamid Elawad, PhD, Primary Health Care Corporation, Qatar
Hanan F. Abdul Rahim, PhD, Qatar University, Qatar
Iheb Bougmiza, PhD, Primary Health Care Corporation, Qatar
Ali S. Omrani, PhD, Hamad Medical Corporation, Qatar
Sami G. Al-Ghamdi, PhD, Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Qatar
Marwa Farag, PhD, Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, Qatar
Ahmed El Idrissi Hamzi, PhD, Former Senior Animal Health Officer
MOPH Team
Shariq Jaffrey, Public Health Research Coordinator, Doha, Qatar, [email protected]
Fatimah Elnour, Journal Support, Ministry of Public Health, Doha, Qatar, [email protected]
Journals Publisher
Salah B. Ajjur, PhD
Acting head of academic journal publications in HBKU press.