In South Sudan, alumni partner to help strengthen health system
Last fall, Isha Nirola, DrPH ’21, arrived at a conference room in Juba, South Sudan, straight from the airport. She’d just had time to drop her bags off and was feeling jetlagged from the 15-hour flight. But she perked up when she saw an unexpected familiar face in the room—her friend from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Deng Nyuon, MPH ’22.
The two were at South Sudan’s Ministry of Health for a high-level steering committee meeting of the Health Sector Transformation Project—a government-led initiative supported by the World Bank and a number of donor countries and non-governmental organizations—with Nyuon from the team representing the Ministry and Nirola the World Bank.
“I actually didn’t see Isha,” said Nyuon. “She saw me, and she couldn’t hold back. We were both excited to see each other again.”
Over the course of the next week, the two worked together to help monitor the project, which supports 816 health facilities across South Sudan in its initial phase of implementation. Its components include working with selected health facilities to improve service delivery, in addition to supporting health workers in areas with limited access to care.
Nyuon served in a consulting role, helping ensure that the project was in alignment with broader Ministry of Health policies and coordinating with representatives from various levels of government. Nirola primarily provided technical advising across the project’s various components, following the Ministry’s lead.
During this trip and a subsequent visit in January, the pair strengthened their friendship while also helping further collaborative efforts between their organizations, they said. Throughout the process, they drew from what they learned at Harvard Chan School.
A Harvard community committed to South Sudan
Nyuon is a practicing orthopedic surgeon and a public health specialist and has been a consultant for the South Sudan Health Ministry for the last three years. Nirola first worked in South Sudan a decade ago, serving as a technical advisor for the Carter Center’s Guinea worm disease eradication campaign under public health luminary Donald Hopkins, MPH ’70. After earning her degree from Harvard Chan School, she worked as a senior advisor at the State Department during the Biden administration before joining the World Bank as a senior health consultant last year.
At Harvard Chan School, Nyuon and Nirola bonded over their experiences and commitment to South Sudan—and joined a network of others at Harvard with an interest in the country, including professors and mentors William Bean and Jesse Bump, and South Sudanese alumni including physician Garang Dut, MPH ’18. As one of just a small handful of South Sudanese students across the University, Nyuon said he deeply valued the opportunity to make these connections. “Harvard made itself a home for me,” he said.
“The work we’re doing is meaningful,” said Nirola. “As we forge ahead in this multi-stakeholder system, it’s just such a blessing to be able to partner with my friend. The common foundation we built during our time at Harvard Chan School—our shared understanding of public health principles and values—has created a natural bridge that enhances our ability to align objectives and foster cooperation between the World Bank and the Ministry of Health.”
Nirola and Nyuon said that their education at Harvard Chan School left them feeling equipped with the technical expertise to do their work in South Sudan. During meetings in Juba, they reflected on what they’d learned, particularly in Bump’s class on the political economy of global health, she said.
The support they received from professors like Bump, Howard Koh, Margaret Kruk, Kimberlyn Leary, John McDonough, and Nancy Turnbull has continued after graduation, they both said.
Nirola noted, “When we sent [several professors] a picture from our meeting, they were genuinely so happy to see their former students working together on a mission to alleviate human suffering.”
