Sameena Conning starting in new position of EIT Health Director of External Affairs

Post created to unite public affairs and communications functions

EIT Health has announced the appointment of Sameena Conning to the new position of EIT Health Director of External Affairs, effective 3 September 2018.

Before joining EIT Health, Conning was Director of Public Affairs at Biogen UK and Ireland. She has more than 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical, biotech and healthcare industries, working in corporate and external affairs.

Conning’s background proved to be an excellent fit for the new position of EIT Health Director of External Affairs. The directorship was created in recognition of the growing importance of effective engagement with the increasingly diverse group of external stakeholders in healthcare innovation.

Conning will be tasked with supplementing and integrating the network’s existing communications and public affairs capability, to underpin a strategic and focused approach that can enhance EIT Health’s position in an ever-evolving external environment.

“I am excited about Sameena starting in her new role – in fact a new position in EIT Health. It is important that we connect communication and public affairs in EIT Health. It will allow us to engage our audiences much more effectively and enable us to tell stories about the impact we are creating,” said Jan-Philipp Beck, CEO of EIT Health.

“I am thrilled to be joining EIT Health, a dynamic and growing organisation that has demonstrated its ability, in collaboration with its expert partners, to foster best-in-class solutions to our biggest healthcare challenges today,” Conning said. “I am looking forward to working with the EIT Health network to augment and drive our mission to shape the healthcare landscape of tomorrow, and drive true meaningful, lasting change for patients and citizens.”

About Sameena Conning

In her previous position, as Director of Public Affairs at Biogen UK and Ireland, Conning was responsible for corporate external engagement strategy, with a particular focus on communications, patient advocacy, media relations, policy and corporate reputation. Her most recent experiences at Biogen include addressing challenges in the access landscape for rare disease medicines as well as environmental analysis of health system preparedness for the first potential disease modifying therapy in Alzheimer’s Disease.

Prior to Biogen, she worked at Novartis, in Basel, Switzerland, as Global Head of Franchise Communications, and also AstraZeneca, where she worked as both Communications Head in the UK office as well as Global Communications Director.

Before AstraZeneca, she worked for more than ten years in healthcare consultancy including two years in New York heading up the Healthcare PR Practice at Burson-Marsteller.

Along with more than 20 years of corporate and external affairs experience in the pharmaceutical, biotech and healthcare industries, Conning holds a BMedSci in Medical Sciences and Pharmacology and a Post Graduate Diploma in Marketing.