Seasoned global health leader brings over 26 years of expertise in complex, multi-stakeholder projects
Baltimore, January 16, 2025 — Leader in combatting global infectious diseases Kelly Curran is joining USAID-funded Supporting, Mobilizing, and Accelerating Research for Tuberculosis Elimination (SMART4TB) as Project Director on January 27.
Former senior director for HIV and Infectious Diseases at Jhpiego, Curran’s career spans a variety of global health’s most pressing issues, from women’s health to HIV, COVID-19, and mpox, working with key stakeholders including country ministries of health, donors, multilateral agencies, researchers, clinicians and affected communities. Driven by a passion for transforming global health on the ground, Curran’s roles have involved designing and implementing effective multi-country programs, leading multidisciplinary teams, directing operations, and conducting research with life-saving results.
“Kelly Curran has an extraordinary record of developing and implementing programs that have changed the trajectory of population health in countries afflicted with high burdens of communicable diseases and health inequities,” said Richard Chaisson, SMART4TB chief of party and professor of medicine and public health at Johns Hopkins University.
“SMART4TB will benefit enormously from the depth of experience and innovative problem solving that Kelly has brought to some incredibly complex challenges,” said Payam Nahid, SMART4TB senior research advisor and Haile T. Debas distinguished professor of global health and executive director of the UCSF Institute for Global Health Sciences. “Her knowledge, passion, and energy will undoubtedly drive us forward in exciting new ways.”
Curran’s most recent role involved overseeing the $391 million PEPFAR/USAID-funded Reaching Impact, Saturation and Epidemic control project, which is focused on supporting national HIV, COVID-19, mpox, and Marburg virus responses. In this project, she helped introduce 3HP TB preventive treatment for people living with HIV, and long-acting HIV prevention products in low- and middle-income countries with nurse-led service delivery models.
“The global responses to COVID-19, HIV, and malaria show that we can change the course of an epidemic when scientific advances in diagnostics, therapeutics and prevention reach the people who need them most,” said Curran. “I am thrilled to join the SMART4TB team, and the global TB response, at this pivotal moment when so much scientific progress is being made against the world’s leading infectious disease killer.”
Curran comes to SMART4TB at an exciting moment, as several multi-country treatment trials, vaccine preparedness, airborne infection control, and operational research projects are launching.