Dr Debrorah Mulongo Barasa

BIOGRAPHY

President William Ruto’s new Health Cabinet Secretary nominee, Dr Deborah Mulongo Barasa, has 15 years’ experience and had a stint at the World Health Organisation, a profile of her shared by State House shows.

Dr Barasa, who will take over from Susan Nakhumicha if approved by Parliament, is a medical doctor specializing in internal medicine and infectious diseases.

“Over 15 years’ field experience as a senior officer with progression to an internal medicine physician and technical advisor having worked in health institutions both national, referral, private and community based organisations,” State House indicates on her official profile. 

State House’s profile of Dr Barasa also showed that she co-led the infectious disease pillar addressing outbreak-prone infections such as respiratory infections (Covid-19, diphtheria),viral hemorrhagic  fevers like Ebola and small vessel disease(SVD) as well as contagious diarrhoea (cholera).

The new Health CS nominee graduated from the University of Nairobi(UoN) in 2006 with a Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery, has a Masters of Medicine in Internal Medicine from the same institution and is currently pursuing a Master’s of Science in Infectious Diseases at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Dr Barasa has worked at Mater Hospital where she was an internal medicine physician, CHANF Community Health Services (CHANF-CNS) which is based in Kitengela, Kajiado County as a consultant physician on the same and was currently working at the World Health Organisation (WHO) Africa Hub which is based in Nairobi.

She also explains that apart from internal medicine/infectious disease her core competencies include communicable and non-communicable disease prevention and control for clinical cases and public health programs.