Mary is the Deputy Chief Scientific Adviser for the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), a role she started in August 2022. Mary is an epidemiologist with expertise in a range of disciplines including clinical trials, implementation science, systems thinking and population-based data, in both the UK and in low- and middle-income countries.
Before joining DHSC, Mary was Head of Population Health at Wellcome where she led their funding of population health research in the UK and low- and middle-income countries and the development of a new strategic focus on mental health. Strategic areas included Wellcome’s Longitudinal Population Studies Strategy, catalysing advances in nutrition, health of the public and multi-morbidity research, and strengthening the pathways through which research evidence improves health.
Before joining Wellcome, Mary was Deputy Director of the Centre for Global Mental Health at LSHTM. Her research included the design and evaluation of complex interventions to improve mental health in low- and middle-income countries, implementation research to ensure that these interventions are scalable and sustainable, and policy influence work to encourage the translation of evidence into policy and practice.