Ira C. Magaziner will continue to work with CHAI as a senior advisor and help drive new CHAI initiatives
For immediate release, Dec. 9, 2019 — The Board of The Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Iain Barton as CEO of CHAI to succeed Ira C. Magaziner who has led the organization since its founding in 2002. After Ira steps down as CEO on May 1, 2020, he has agreed to continue to work with CHAI for the foreseeable future as a senior advisor to Iain and to drive selected new programs.
In making the announcement, CHAI Board Chair Dr. Tachi Yamada said, “We are excited by the appointment of Iain as CEO of CHAI and the experience and creativity that he promises to bring to CHAI from his background as a physician and as an entrepreneur in African markets. We are also delighted that CHAI will continue to benefit from Ira’s vision and leadership.”
CHAI was founded in 2002 with the transformational goal of saving the lives of millions of people living with HIV/AIDS. Today, along with HIV, CHAI is working with governments in 36 low-and middle-income countries to prevent and treat malaria, tuberculosis, hepatitis, and cancer; accelerate the rollout of lifesaving vaccines; reduce maternal, infant, and child mortality; combat chronic malnutrition, promote sexual and reproductive health, and strengthen health systems. CHAI has negotiated over 140 agreements that have lowered the prices of drugs, vaccines, diagnostics and other health products by 50 to 90 percent throughout the developing world. CHAI has almost 2,000 employees, a budget of over US$220 million for 2020, and has grown at 20 percent each year in recent years. Learn more about our work.
About Iain Barton
Iain Barton is an expert in developing and implementing best practices for global health. A committed South African, Iain is a medical doctor with 10 years clinical practice and 20 years in healthcare business management, specializing in pharmaceutical supply and market shaping.
Iain’s most recent role has been as Executive Vice-President—Healthcare for Imperial Logistics, Africa’s largest supplier of medications, where he has coordinated strategy, innovation, and solution design across all of the company’s healthcare businesses and driven new market expansion.
Iain was responsible for developing the concept of Regional Distribution Centers to support the scale-up of PEPFAR across the continent and of the Supply Chain Control Tower that supports the Global Fund’s Pooled Procurement Mechanism for antiretroviral medications for HIV. Other innovations developed under Iain’s leadership include Unjani Clinics, Warehouse-in-a-Box, Clinic-in-a-Box and SSiH – a mega-distributor model enhancing access to medicines across Africa.
About CHAI
The Clinton Health Access Initiative, Inc. (CHAI) is a global health organization committed to saving lives and reducing the burden of disease in low-and middle-income countries, while strengthening the capabilities of governments and the private sector in those countries to create and sustain high-quality health systems that can succeed without our assistance.
