Dr. Onikepe Owolabi

Onikepe Owolabi joined IntraHealth on October 17, 2022 as the Senior Global Director MNCH/FP. She will be working from Rutherford, New Jersey.

Oni is a physician and epidemiologist with 13 years of experience in maternal and reproductive health research, monitoring and evaluation. Her career focus has been on improving the measurement of reproductive morbidity and quality of care within health systems at the population level and expanding access to sexual and reproductive health services in sub-Saharan Africa and South-East Asia. Before joining IntraHealth she was the Program Director of the Data-driven Policy Initiative for women’s health at Vital Strategies where she led the development, and implementation of programs strengthening the collection and use of routinely collected maternal and reproductive health data for decision-making and policymaking with Ministries of Health in Bangladesh, Rwanda, and Uganda. Prior to this, she was a Senior Research Scientist at the Guttmacher Institute where she led and co-led the design and implementation of research studies in multiple countries focused on estimating improving population-level definition and measurement of neglected sexual and reproductive health indicators and advocating for access to comprehensive evidence-based care for women within countries and in regional and global fora.

Oni completed her medical degree at Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria, her Masters in Global Health at the University of Oxford, and her PhD at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She currently serves as an academic editor for PLOS One, Plos Global Health, and Frontiers in Global Women’s Health and has published in several leading scientific journals. Onikepe loves hiking and biking trails, lots of time for introspection, and cooking for family and friends.

She is also part of the 2022 Cohort of the WomenLiftHealth U.S. Leadership Journey, an experiential, and results-driven fellowship for mid to senior-career women in health whose work and partnerships serve target populations in low- and middle-income countries.