The Wellcome Trust's Jeremy Farrar has always been on the move, Stat News reports. As a child, Farrar's family bounced around from Singapore to Cyprus, New Zealand, and Libya, among others, and now as the head of the Wellcome Trust, he can be found anywhere from Geneva to India or Malawi to Saudi Arabia.
"All that time spent in far away places with different cultures and standards of living shaped the views he brings to discussions that bedevil the global health community at times," Stat News writes.
After switching his university studies from English, economics, and history to the sciences, Farrar became a medical doctor with a focus on neurology and did a PhD in neuroimmunology. But as he was finishing up his PhD and was giving a talk at a conference, he realized that wasn't quite what he wanted to do. He instead secured a spot leading Oxford University's Clinical Research Unit in Vietnam, sending him on the path to become a research benefactor, Stat News reports.
Now as head of the Wellcome Trust, Farrar want the charity to take on even more of a global focus, Stat News writes.
"We are in the privileged position of being an independent, philanthropic organization. If we can't act boldly and with flexibility, then who can?" Farrar says.