Sally C. Davies

Professor Sally Davies is the Director General (DG) of Research and Development for the Department of Health and National Health Service (NHS). Sally has been actively involved in NHS R&D from its establishment. As DG she developed the new government research strategy, Best Research for Best Health with a budget of over £775m, is now responsible for implementation of the National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) and is a Board member of Office for the Strategic Coordination of Health Research (OSCHR). The DH and NIHR fund applied, clinical and policy research, research infrastructure, research capacity development and support the NHS in its research activities. Key National Programmes include the internationally recognised “Health Technology Assessment Programme, Service Delivery and Organisation” and “Invention for Innovation”. New initiatives include the recently announced Biomedical Research Centres and Experimental Medicine and Cancer Research facilities. Sally led the UK delegation to the WHO Ministerial Summit November 2004, spoke on R&D at the World Health Assembly May 2005 on R&D, is a member of the WHO Global Advisory Committee on Health Research (ACHR) and is currently chairing the Expert Advisory Committee for the development of the WHO research strategy.