Tamar Gabunia

Tamar Gabunia, MD, MPH, is an experienced international public health expert. Dr. Gabunia is a medical doctor from Tbilisi State Medical University, holds an MPH from University of Georgia, United States and is fluent in English and Russian. She has more than 20 years of experience working in health sectors in low-and-middle-income country settings fostering health system strengthening and TB, MDR TB-focused activities. She has spent the last 18 years in senior level management positions leading and supporting public health initiatives, including TB, Malaria, HIV, Primary Health Care, health financing, governance, and human resources. The focus of her work for the past six years has been strengthening national health systems to address TB and MDR TB in high TB burden countries. Dr. Gabunia in her capacity of the first deputy minister (2019-2024) has led and coordinated the health sector response for COVID pandemic in Georgia. In 2011-2016, as Chief of Party for the Georgia Tuberculosis Prevention Project/USAID, she has successfully led a team of local and international experts and worked with local government officials to strengthen the national TB response. There, she spear-headed the fostering of public-private partnerships, the integration of services into primary care, the integration of mental health services in MDR TB treatment and the participation of civil society organizations. In 2017-2018 she served as a special advisor and a temporary Chief of Party for Cambodia Malaria Elimination Project funded by USAID. In 2019, Dr Gabunia worked as the technical team leader of the USAID TB Platforms for Sustainable Detection, Care and Treatment Project in the Philippines. As Senior Technical Advisor for TB CARE II project, Dr. Gabunia has significantly contributed to the development, roll out and scale up of many initiatives, including a leading role on developing comprehensive guidelines on FAST for Vietnam, introduction of innovative infection prevention and control interventions such as GUV model in India, Quality Improvement handbook, guidelines and training package for South Africa, development of TB costing tools, development of TB-DM training package for South Africa and Indonesia, development of a Pharmacovigilance (PV) package for Swaziland, Quality Improvement Framework and Guidelines for HIV in Malawi, and Patient-centered care framework for Philippines, contributed to the development of TB-focused technical strategies for South Africa (e.g. IPC, mHealth, MDR TB, Capacity Building, Small Grants, lab diagnostic, etc.) as well as development of the assessment framework on integration of TB package into the National Health Insurance for Philippines, India, and Peru.