Plenary 2: Health Systems and Climate Change

Dimitra Panteli leads the team of the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies in Berlin and the Observatory’s work on innovation. She studied medicine and public health and has been working in health systems research for 15 years.
Dimitra’s work focuses on supporting evidence-informed decisions in health policy and practice, particularly around the implementation of different types of innovation towards improving health system performance and resilience. Before joining the Observatory in October 2020, Dimitra was senior research fellow and department coordinator at the Department of Health Care Management, Technische Universität Berlin (TUB), where she remains a lecturer in Public Health. She spent the 2016-2017 academic year in Washington, DC as a Commonwealth Fund Harkness Fellow in Healthcare Policy and Practice.

Ms. Federica Margheri is Executive Director of the European Health Management Association (EHMA), where she leads the organisation’s strategic direction and represents the voice of health management at European and international level. She engages regularly with the European Parliament, the European Commission, the World Health Organization, national authorities, industry and civil society, promoting health management as a strategic lever for resilient, sustainable and people-centred health systems.

She works at the intersection of the EHMA membership, Board of Directors and Secretariat, ensuring the effective delivery of the Association’s mission and strengthening its role as a convenor of policy dialogue, research collaboration and professional exchange across Europe. A central part of her role is building and maintaining partnerships with European institutions, international organisations and project consortia, as well as overseeing EHMA’s portfolio of EU-funded initiatives and flagship events.

Ms Margheri brings over 15 years of experience in project and financial management, communications, operations, administration and governance within European and international organisations. Prior to joining EHMA, she worked with international NGOs and held positions at the European Commission and the European Parliament. She holds a Master’s degree in Policy and Diplomacy and a Master’s degree in International Affairs and Diplomacy.

Nicole Mauer is a Technical Officer based at the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies’ Brussels office.

Her work focuses on innovation, evidence-informed health policy and health systems in Europe. She supports the Observatory’s portfolio on innovation and country monitoring activities through the State of Health in the EU programme and as the HSPM country co-editor for Malta. Her work also focuses on comparative health systems and policy research spanning a range of topics, including health care access, non-communicable diseases, climate and health, and EU health policy.

Before joining the Observatory, Nicole completed a Blue Book traineeship at the European Commission (DG SANTE) and worked at the Robert Koch Institute in Germany. She holds a medical degree from the University of Milan (Italy), a medical doctorate from the University of Heidelberg (Germany) and an MSc in Public Health from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (UK).

Antonio Parenti is currently the Director for Public Health, Cancer and Human Security in the Directorate General for Human and Food Security of the European Commission
Until August 2024 he was the Head of the European Commission Representation in Italy. He represented the Commission in Italy under the political authority of President Ursula von der Leyen and oversaw the two offices of Rome and Milan.
Before Italy, he was the Minister Counsellor in charge of the economic affairs, trade and development section of the EU Delegation to the United Nations. In that capacity, he served as Chief negotiator of the European Union for the UN Global Compact on Migration. Much of his career took place in the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Trade where he served as Deputy Chief negotiator of the free trade agreement with Japan, responsible for relations with the countries of the Far East including the China and Chief negotiator for the accession of several countries to the WTO. He served not only in Brussels and New York but also in Moscow where he served as the Counsellor for economic and commercial affairs of the EU Delegation during the final stages of Russia’s accession negotiations to the WTO.
Antonio Parenti has a Law Degree and a LL.M in European Law from the University of Bologna and a Master of Arts in International Relations from the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (Johns Hopkins University). He is the author of numerous articles and essays on European affairs and international trade.

Dr Dorota Jarosinska is a programme manager at the WHO European Centre for Environment, Climate Change and Health in Bonn, Germany. She leads programme on Living Environments and Climate Mitigation, which covers health aspects of air pollution, climate change mitigation, environmentally sustainable health systems, chemical safety, and noise. She coordinated the development of WHO global air quality guidelines; worked with Member States on the topic of clime resilient, low carbon and environmentally sustainable health systems.

Trained as a medical doctor, she holds PhD in medicine. A specialist in public health, she has over 30 years of experience in environmental medicine and environmental health at national and international levels. Completed postgraduate training in environmental health for physicians and was a Fulbright scholar at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, US. Worked for nine years at the European Environment Agency on human health and well-being aspects.

Professor Cathryn Tonne is an environmental epidemiologist based at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health focusing on the health effects of air pollution from outdoor and household sources and their intersection with climate change. One of her main research interests is in the health co-benefits of climate change mitigation. She is co-director of the Lancet Countdown for Health and Climate Change in Europe and leads the working group focused on mitigation actions and health co-benefits. She coordinates CATALYSE, a five-year Horizon Europe project focused on climate change and health.

Raphaël Taravella is a preparedness officer on cross-border threats to health within the French Ministry of Health’s Health Security Centre. He specializes in coordinating the implementation of the International Health Regulations, specifically on border-health control and preparing the health care system to pandemics and emerging disease at a national level. This includes elaborating regulations, guidelines for local implementation and developing specific capabilities. He was previously a preparedness officer on climate related events and vector-borne diseases at the Regional Health Agency for the Île-de-France region, which includes the Paris aera. In this position he coordinated the mosquito-borne disease surveillance and response plan for the region as well as the regional public health response plan to climate events, including heat waves, cold snaps and floods. He was also associated with integrating climate risks in hospital renovation funding programs.

Mikel Subiza-Pérez currently works as a Ramón y Cajal Fellow at the Basque Centre for Climate Change (BC3). Throughout his research career, he has focused on understanding how cities influence mental health and which urban factors contribute to healthier, higher-quality lives. His research interests lie at the intersection of urban planning, social processes, health, and human behaviour. From 2022 to 2024, he undertook a research stay at the Bradford Institute for Health Research, where he led studies using data from the Born in Bradford pregnancy cohort and National Health Service (NHS) administrative records. In recent years, he has developed instruments to measure environmental health knowledge and competencies among healthcare professionals. Since late 2024, he has been a member of the steering committee of the Urban Health Section of the European Public Health Association (EUPHA) and a member of the EUPHA Nxt Advisory Group.