Burnet’s Global Adolescent Health Working Group works with youth in Myanmar and several other countries
Burnet Institute is delighted to welcome Dr Julie Hennegan, one of the world’s leading menstrual health researchers, to the Global Adolescent Health Working Group as Senior Research Officer.
After three years at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, USA, Dr Hennegan brings a wealth of knowledge to Burnet.
Her recent research has largely focused on menstrual health and hygiene in East Africa, and she holds a PhD from the University of Oxford.
Associate Professor Peter Azzopardi, Co-Head of the Global Adolescent Health Group, said Dr Hennegan’s appointment is a major coup for Burnet, and for Melbourne’s global health community.
“Julie is a global leader in menstrual health research and we’re delighted to have Julie join our team,” Associate Professor Azzopardi said.
“Her expertise is not only directly relevant to the work that we do in our priority countries, Myanmar and Papua New Guinea, but also in terms of advancing adolescent health more broadly and ensuring gender equity.”
At Burnet, Dr Hennegan will lead a multi-country study in partnership with UNFPA and UNICEF exploring pathways to adolescent pregnancy to enable a more targeted policy response.
“I’m really excited to expand the reproductive health aspect of my work,” Dr Hennegan said, “and I’m really excited to expand my menstrual health work into this region of the world.
“There has been incredible attention to menstrual health in East Africa where much of my work has been situated.
“At Burnet, I am excited to play a role in drawing more attention to this important topic in Australia, where there remain many unmet menstrual health needs, as well as in Southeast Asia and the Pacific.
“They’ve been more neglected geographies in terms of understanding those needs,” she said.
Dr Hennegan has led and contributed to adolescent health and gender research in a number of different high, middle and low-income settings.
Associate Professor Azzopardi said Dr Hennegan’s expertise working with young people and country partners will help to bring a global best practise approach to Burnet’s work.
“A lot of our work involves research partnerships and local stakeholders’ young people. Julie brings a huge amount of expertise from her work in other complex settings to Burnet,” he said.
“That’s what I’m most pleased about in terms of this appointment. Julie has already demonstrated a commitment to partnership and capacity development. That’s front and centre with all the work that Burnet does.”
