AO, MD, PhD, BSc (Med), FRACP, FAFPHM, FFPH(UK), FRACGP(Hon)

Stephen Leeder is a professor of public health and community medicine at the University of Sydney. He has a long history of involvement in public health research, educational development and policy. His research interests as a clinical epidemiologist have been mainly asthma and cardiovascular disease. His interest in public health was stimulated by spending 1968 in the highlands of Papua New Guinea.

Professor Leeder graduated in medical science from the University of Sydney in 1962, in medicine in 1966 and as a Doctor of Philosophy in 1974. He is a fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and member of the Policy and Advocacy Committee of the RACP’s Australasian Faculty of Public Health Medicine. He was Dean of the Medical Faculty at the University of Sydney between 1996 and 2002 during which time he oversaw the implementation of a new graduate educational program and the formation of an extensive rural education network for medical students. He has also served on the Senate of the University of Sydney for several terms, had two double terms as national president of the Public Health Association, and one triennium as chair of the Health Advisory Committee of NHMRC.

Professor Leeder was the Foundation Professor of Community Medicine at the University of Newcastle (1977-1985) and played a major role in the development of the innovative medical curriculum. He was also the Foundation Director of the Newcastle Rockefeller Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics. The Centre was established to develop clinical epidemiologists in the Asian and Pacific Region, one of three training centres in the International Clinical Epidemiology Network which continues to flourish.

In 2003-04, Professor Leeder worked at Columbia University, New York, in the Earth Institute and Mailman School of Public Health, developing a substantial report, based on research data and scientific interpretation, of the economic consequences of cardiovascular disease (CVD) in developing economies. The report, A Race against Time: the challenge of cardiovascular disease in developing economies, concentrated upon the macroeconomic consequences of CVD, and especially on the fact that one-third of CVD deaths in many developing countries were occurring among people of working age.

The report emphasized the need for a clear understanding of the size of the problem of CVD in developing nations and ways of taking action, by mobilizing business, non-government organizations and other components of civil society, to create preventive environments (better food, better urban design, primary care, tobacco control) that would reduce the toll of CVD. This work has received international recognition and Professor Leeder has been invited to speak about it in many places, including Geneva (WHO), Washington DC (World Bank and IMF), Barbados, UCLA, Mexico, and Brazil. With research funding from the Initiative for Cardiovascular Health Research in the Developing Countries (IC-Health), Professor Leeder has continued to work on the economic consequences of cardiovascular disease and the translation of these economic insights into effective preventive and control strategies through the recruitment of industry, labour and treasury and finance ministers from developing countries.

Professor Leeder is currently Director of the Australian Health Policy Institute, an affiliated unit of the School of Public Health in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Sydney. The Institute provides a high-level capability for authoritative, independent, non-partisan analysis of major health policy questions which confront Australian and international health systems. The Institute hosts seminars to promote academic, professional and public debate on policy issues and provides an educational capacity in health policy, policy analysis and policy research in the University's teaching programs. The Institute has four themes: equity; futures; serious and continuing illnesses and; governance.

The Institute is the Australasian base of the Oxford Health Alliance (OxHA). The Oxford Health Alliance (OxHA) serves to prevent and reduce the global impact of chronic disease. It stands for innovative action with diverse stakeholders around three risk factors (tobacco use, physical inactivity and poor diet) that lead to four chronic diseases (CVD, diabetes, chronic lung diseases and some cancers) contributing to more than 50% of deaths worldwide.

Professor Leeder is also co-director of the Menzies Centre for Health Policy, a joint enterprise with The Australian National University. A major theme of the Centre is the control of, and care for people with, serious and continuing illness including chronic obstructive pulmonary Disease, chronic heart failure and complicated diabetes. The Menzies Centre is supported by the Menzies Foundation and a five-year NHMRC program grant for this purpose. The Serious and Continuing Illness Policy and Practice Study (SCIPPS) aims to find policy and health systems solutions for people with these illnesses and those who care for them, to improve their quality of life and reduce avoidable hospital admissions. These issues will be examined through a series of interventions and evaluations. The interventions will be developed by the research team working closely and collaboratively with patients and their carers, either directly (e.g. patients, doctors, nurses and other clinicians) or indirectly (e.g. health service managers and policy advisers).

Professor Leeder has 35 years of experience in epidemiological research, medical education reform and in mentoring young investigators. Most of his research has been collaborative and he has always sought ways of ensuring the career development of members of his teams.