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Mariel is a Research Fellow at IGHD, contributing to the Health Policy and Systems Research work package of the HIMM Project (Co-designing Health Innovations to Reach Mobile Men with Co-Morbidities in Uganda and Zambia). Her work focuses on understanding how health systems, policies, and service delivery environments shape access to care for mobile men living with infectious and non-communicable disease co-morbidities in Uganda and Zambia. She conducts qualitative health systems research, policy analysis, stakeholder engagement, and comparative cross-country research in collaboration with partners across Africa and Europe.

Prior to this role, Mariel supported the coordination and implementation of several international research programmes within IGHD, including the ReBUILD for Resilience research consortium, the UNHCR Health System Resilience, Enhancement and Refugee Responses Project, and the HIMM Project. Across these initiatives, she contributed to multi-country research coordination, qualitative research, collaborative analysis, and dissemination activities in fragile and conflict-affected settings. Through ReBUILD for Resilience, she contributed to studies examining health system resilience in Afghanistan, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Lebanon, and Gaza, with particular interests in equity, resilience, and inclusive research practice. She presented findings from the consortium’s study, “Resilience in Fragile Health Systems: Coping with COVID-19 in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Lebanon, and Gaza,” at the 11th International Conference on Public Health (ICOPH) in Bangkok, Thailand.

Mariel holds an MSc in Global Health Policy from the University of Edinburgh, where her dissertation examined barriers to equitable, culturally appropriate, and trauma-informed maternity care for Indigenous women, gender-diverse, and Two-Spirit individuals across Canada.

Her research interests include health policy and systems research, sexual and reproductive health, gender and health, health equity, and the strengthening of resilient health systems in low-resource and crisis-affected settings. She is particularly committed to research approaches that centre the perspectives and expertise of local researchers and communities, and to generating evidence that supports more equitable and responsive health systems.