Derek Yach is currently a global health consultant. He was the president and founder of the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World. Throughout his career, he has led smoking cessation and harm reduction research and policy development. He is a passionate advocate of health promotion and disease prevention and advances private-public partnerships and technology innovation as the means to accelerate progress in global health.
Yach is a former World Health Organization cabinet director and executive director for noncommunicable diseases and mental health, where he led development of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. He is also the former chief health officer of the Vitality Group, senior vice president of global health and agriculture policy at PepsiCo, director of global health at the Rockefeller Foundation, and a professor of global health at Yale University. He has authored or co-authored more than 250 peer-reviewed articles on global health and has served on several advisory boards, including the World Economic Forum, Cornerstone Capital, and the Wellcome Trust. From 2007 to 2016, he served on the program advisory committee of the Clinton Global Initiative. He currently serves on the APCO International Advisory Group and is consultant/adviser to several biotech companies and to the U.K.’s Our Future Health.
Yach is a native of South Africa and has an honorary Doctor of Science degree from Georgetown University, a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degree from the University of Cape Town, a Bachelor of Science degree (Hons Epi) from the University of Stellenbosch, and a Master of Public Health degree from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He is an enthusiastic and daily open water swimmer.