[Dr. Julio Frenk has been president of the University of Miami since August of 2015. Prior to joining the University of Miami, he served for almost seven years as Dean of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the T & G Angelopoulos Professor of Public Health and International Development, a joint appointment with the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. Dr. Frenk was appointed Federal Secretary of Health of Mexico in 2000, a position he held until 2006. He was the founding director-general of the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico, one of the leading institutions of its kind in the developing world. He also served as executive director in charge of Evidence and Information for Policy at the World Health Organization and as senior fellow in the global health program of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, among other leadership positions. Dr. Frenk holds a medical degree from the National University of Mexico, as well as a Master of Public Health and a joint Ph.D. in Medical Care Organization and in Sociology from the University of Michigan. As a fourth-generation physician whose paternal grandparents fled Germany in the 1930s to avoid persecution and build a new life in Mexico, Dr. Frenk expresses his deep gratitude for the kindness of strangers into a lifelong mission to improve the health, education, and well-being of people around the world.
Felicia Marie Knaul is the Director of both the Institute for Advanced Study of the Americas and Hemispheric and Global Affairs at the University of Miami. She is also a Full Professor at the university’s Miller School of Medicine and previously served as Director of the Harvard Global Equity Initiative. Dr. Knaul is Founding President of Tómatelo a Pecho A.C., a Mexican NGO dedicated to promoting women’s health and equity. Currently, she serves as Co-Chair of the Lancet Commission on Cancer And Health Systems and the Lancet Commission on Gender-based Violence and Maltreatment of Young People, and previously chaired the Lancet Commission on Global Access to Palliative Care and Pain Relief. Dr. Knaul has held senior, federal government positions at the Ministries of Education and Social Development of Mexico, and the Colombian Department of Planning and worked on health reform and social development in both countries. She has produced nearly 300 academic and policy publications. Her father, Sigmund Knaul, was a Holocaust survivor who endured five years of incarceration beginning at age 15 and her grandparents were murdered in Auschwitz. Her work in international development, access to health care and poverty alleviation, and to the eradication of violence against women and children is motivated by her family history of trauma and genocide.
Haley Draznin has spent over 10 years in various roles at international news outlets as a reporter, producer and editor. She founded and launched her production company, Haynow Media in 2021, with the mission to help brands produce high-quality content that is educational, informative, and builds community. Her work focuses on topics that range from business and politics to historical events, global economy, women in finance, Web3 and cryptocurrency, and human interest stories. An Emmy-nominated journalist, she spent nearly a decade at CNN where she covered major news stories including the 2020 and 2016 presidential election, Hurricanes Michael and Florence, UK Brexit vote, among others. Her work has been nominated for two 2019 Emmys for outstanding coverage of a breaking news story in a newscast for CNN Newsroom New York bomb evacuation and outstanding breaking news coverage for CNN International Yemen school bus bombing. She launched the CNN Business series “Boss Files with Poppy Harlow” and has produced interviews with some of the most successful CEOs and leaders around the world including Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Hillary Clinton, Ivanka Trump, Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, Richard Branson, Melinda Gates, among others. Draznin holds a bachelor’s degree in international studies and journalism from Emory University.
