Dr. Peter Odili’s First Daughter, Adaeze Oreh, Conferred With Professorialship Honor

Prof. Adaeze Oreh :

All you need to know about Dr.Peter Odili’s First Daughter and Immediate Past Rivers State Commissioner for Health.

Professor Adaeze Oreh is a Consultant Family Physician and the immediate past Honourable Commissioner for Health in Rivers State, Nigeria.

She has over two decades of private and public healthcare experience, and prior to her appointment as Commissioner, was the Country Director of Planning, Research and Statistics for Nigeria’s National Blood Service Commission (NBSC) where she was actively involved in the process leading up to the enactment of the National Blood Service Commission Act 2021, and secured a grant from Fund for Innovation in Development (FID) for an innovative technology for transfusion to mitigate the impacts of blood shortage in Nigeria.

Prof. Oreh was also a Senior Health Policy Advisor with the Department of Hospital Services in Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Health, Adjunct Senior Lecturer with Baze University College of Medicine and Health Sciences teaching undergraduate Epidemiology, Health Policy and Planning, and Contemporary Issues in Public Health. Prof Dr. Oreh also sat on the Governing Council of Pamo University of Medical Sciences – Nigeria’s first private university of Medical Sciences.

She is a Senior Fellow for Global Health with the Aspen Institute in Washington DC, and a Fellow of the West African College of Physicians contributing to the post-graduate training of clinical residents in Family Medicine, a Fellow of the Kofi Annan Global Health Leadership Programme, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene and the Royal Society of Public Health, a Member of the White Ribbon Alliance for Safe Motherhood Global Strategy Advisory Group and the International Society of Blood Transfusion COVID-19 Working Group, Donors, and Donation Working Party, and Immune Therapy Sub-group. With her vast experience and expertise in blood services in Africa, in 2021, she was invited by Harvard University (Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard T.H Chan School of Public Health) to support a cohort of master’s degree students in a project on blood services in Nigeria.She recently contributed on a Global Expert Panel convened by the Belgian Red Cross-Flanders to develop a manual on Blood Donor Recruitment in Africa.

Prof. Oreh holds a Bachelor of Medicine & Surgery (MBBS) degree from University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Master of Science (MSc) degrees in International Health Management from Imperial College and Public Health from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Fellowship of the West African College of Physicians in Family Medicine; and is currently awaiting presentation of her Doctoral Thesis in Global Health at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. Additionally, she holds Leadership, Management and Public Policy certifications from Harvard Kennedy School of Government,University of Oxford Business School, Harvard Chan School of Public Health, University of Bath, and the University of Washington.

Between 2009 and 2014, Prof. Oreh was the Coordinator in charge of Abuja Federal Capital Territory, Nasarawa, and Niger States for Nigeria’s then National Blood Transfusion Service, where she worked in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Health, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). Her role was critical to national blood and emergency services policy formulation, data analytics and management, operations supervision, quality assurance and emergency preparedness and response.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, she drew on her risk communications expertise, taking part in nearly 40 television and radio interviews nationally and internationally, and publishing over 60 editorials to help educate the public on the pandemic.

Before being appointed Commissioner for Health, she regularly conducted voluntary community medical outreach and advocacy campaigns through her foundation, Kaibeya Care Foundation Africa, providing medical and educational support to under-served communities in Northern Nigeria. She also sits on several non-profit boards in Nigeria and West Africa, volunteering, and supporting humanitarian initiatives in blood safety, medical services, maternal and child health, literacy, education, women, and youth empowerment.

A prolific writer on prevalent health and development issues in Africa, Prof. Oreh has authored publications in international, national, and local media outlets. She is a recognised advocate for respectful, dignified quality healthcare that addresses health inequities, universal health coverage and quality medical education in her advocacy and communication, and has been invited to speak on several global platforms.

In March 2026, she was nominated ‘African Mental Health Advocate of the Year’ by Africa Golden Awards, and spoke on topical issues such as Universal Health Coverage and Women’s Leadership at the 78th World Health Assembly in Geneva in 2025, Ibrahim Governance Weekend in Marrakech in 2025, and at the 74th United Nations General Assembly in New York in 2019.

A member of the third cohort (2023 – 2024) of the Kofi Annan Fellowship in Global Health Fellowship with the African Union, Africa Centers for Disease Control, and the Kofi Annan Foundation, she was an invited speaker at the third Conference on Public Health in Africa which held in Lusaka, Zambia in 2024.

In 2019, Prof. Adaeze Oreh was named one of 25 recipients of Aspen Institute’s New Voices Fellowship¬¬¬—an initiative which recognises changemakers in global health and development and is one of 15 accomplished Amujae Leaders announced by the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Presidential Center for Women and Development in early 2021. On International Women’s Day, 2021 she was named one of the 100 Most Inspiring Women in Nigeria and listed amongst 100 Leading Women and the Top 100 Career Women in Nigeria and was named a Neglected Tropical Diseases Champion by the Global First Ladies Alliance and The END Fund. Dr Oreh has also been awarded the Sir Ahmadu Bello (Sardauna) Platinum Leadership Award of Excellence and Africa Healthcare Award for Excellence in Public Health. She won a Best Poster Prize at the International Society of Blood Transfusion 2021 Congress in Amsterdam for research she led and coordinated on blood services in 34 tertiary hospitals in Nigeria during the COVID-19 pandemic, and a Best Poster Prize in the Blood Donation category at the 2021 British Blood Transfusion Society Conference for research. She also led and coordinated on the impact of COVID-19 on Nigeria’s National Blood Service.

In barely one year following her appointment as Honourable Commissioner for Health, some of the initiatives delivered under her watch included the kick-starting of the state’s health insurance scheme – Rivers State Contributory Health Protection Programme, revival of 24-hours emergency medical services and ambulance system, establishment of acute malnutrition management sites, introduction of mental health services and primary eye care into the primary healthcare system, introduction of obstetric imaging in primary health care, the opening of a 750,000L/day medical oxygen plant, free malaria diagnosis and antimalarial treatment, expanded bedspace capacity in the state teaching hospital, unlocking promotion of health workers across the state, payment of 2-year residency training grant, full accreditation of undergraduate medical training and multiple specialties in the state university and teaching hospital, cutting across internal medicine, surgery, orthopaedics, paediatrics, obstetrics and gynaecology, and radiology; accreditation of the Rivers State College of Nursing Science with 142% increase in training quota, and the expansion of digitalisation in the state health sector. Other on-going projects which she initiated include the completion of five (5) 200-bed capacity zonal hospitals, a drug rehabilitation centre, upgrading of the state neuropsychiatric hospital, and the construction of three (3) new general hospitals. Additionally, she led Rivers State to win the Primary Healthcare Leadership Challenge award by UNICEF, Gates Foundation, Aliko Dangote Foundation and National Primary Healthcare Development Agency (NPHCDA) for three (3) consecutive years – 2023, 2024, and 2025.

Prof. Adaeze Oreh is also a recipient of the 2026 LinkedIn Africa Global Health Top Voices 2026, Montegut Global Scholars 2021 award by the World Organization of Family Doctors and the American Board of Family Medicine Foundation, 2021 Africa Healthcare Awardee for Excellence in Public Health, a 2022 Exceptional Women Advancing Healthcare in Africa awardee, one of 2022 and 2024 Fifty Most Inspiring Women in Nigeria by Business Day, and in March 2025, was named one of This Day’s 50 Nigerian ‘Power Women’ alongside H.E Senator Remi Tinubu, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, H.E Amina J. Mohammed, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

On the 2025 World Earth Day in New York, she was announced one of the Top 50 Most Influential People of African Descent (MIPAD) for Philanthropy and Social Impact. She has received numerous awards in the Niger Delta region, including Kings of Pitakwa 2026 Rivers Woman of the Year 2026, Niger Delta Health Commissioner of the Year 2026, Rivers Health Sector Personality of the Year, South South Media & Entertainment Woman of the Year 2025, DMOMA Most Impactful Health Policy Advocate 2025, the One Rivers Coalition Best Performing Commissioner 2024, and the Nigerian Medical Association, Rivers State Roll of Honour award.

Prof. Oreh recently shared her career journey titled “Accessible Quality Healthcare – a doorway to improved wellbeing, opportunity, empowerment, and a better future” at TedX Abuja. With over 125 publications on primary healthcare, infectious diseases, health systems and policy in peer-reviewed journals and mainstream media, her work has been cited by academics and researchers from across the world, and over the past year alone, her research has been cited in countries such as Australia, China, Singapore, India, United Kingdom, Ireland, Portugal, Hungary, Georgia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Ethiopia, Ghana, and Nigeria. She is the co-author of two books, ‘Lessons Life Has Taught Me’ and ‘Sickle Cell Disease in Sub-Saharan Africa,’ with four (4) new books in various stages of publication.

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