Professor Kate Ardern, Honorary Professor of Public Health Salford University, Visiting Professor of Public Health Chester University formerly Director of Public Health and Chief Emergency Planning Officer, Wigan Council and Greater Manchester Combined Authority Lead DPH for Health Protection and Emergency Planning.

Kate read Medicine at Manchester University and has an MSc in Epidemiology and Health. She was awarded Fellowship of the Faculty of Public Health 2006. In addition to her honorary academic roles, she is a member of General Advisory Council of the Kings Fund, expert member of Lord Filkin’s “A Covenant for Health” commission, public Health advisor to the Impact Investing Institute Place Coalition, local systems expert on Liverpool University’s NIHR Emerging New Infections and Zoonoses Research Group and co-chairs Reform think tank’s “Reimaging Health” advisory council. She is one of the expert contributors to Debbie Abrahams MP’s new documentary “The Unequal Pandemic” which was launched in Parliament in Sept 2023. Since retiring in July 2022 Kate has become a Service Improvement Associate for the Local Government Association and a Population Health Associate for the Kings Fund. She regularly works with the British Academy contributing to their work on health inequalities and health protection.

Initially working in secondary care, Kate specialised in public health in 1990. She became the country’s first consultant in health protection based in Liverpool n 1998 and then her first DPH role in South Liverpool Primary Care Trust in 2002 and senior public health roles in Cheshire Strategic Health Authority and NHS North West

In 2008 Kate was appointed as a joint DPH between NHS Ashton, Leigh and Wigan and Wigan Council. In addition to being Director of Public Health, she also was the Borough’s Chief Emergency Planning Officer.  Kate was also the Greater Manchester Combined Authority Lead DPH for Health Protection and Emergency Planning, co-chairing the GM Local Health Resilience Partnership and a member of the Greater Manchester Resilience Forum.

Throughout the Covid 19 Pandemic, Kate was a core member of the Greater Manchester Strategic Coordinating Group leading the development of GM’s successful integrated contract tracing system and was a senior adviser in attendance at the Mayor of Greater Manchester’s Emergency Committee appearing at several of his press conferences and making regular media appearances as the public health spokesperson for Greater Manchester.  In recognition of her contribution to pandemic response, the Financial Times named her as one of their eighteen international “Women of the Year 2020”.