The Alliance Lift is a series that spotlights the journeys of Alliance alumni shaping health systems around the globe. In this Q&A, Mr Jeffrey Knezovich, a Technical Officer at the Alliance, talks with Ms Racha Fadlallah, a Senior Scientific Officer at the Knowledge to Policy (K2P) Center at the American University of Beirut and co-founder of the SPARK Center for systematic reviews in health policy and systems research. Beyond Lebanon, she also serves on the Board of Health Systems Global and contributes to the strategic direction of WHO’s Evidence-Informed Policy Network (EVIPNet).

Jeffrey spoke with Racha about her path into health policyand systems research, her work strengthening evidence-informed decision-making in Lebanon and globally, how crises and change shape the way evidence is used today, and her hopes and expectations for next year’s Ninth Global Symposium on Health Systems Research.

She shares how her early experiences shaped her commitment to making evidence accessible, what it means to work in a context of political and economic instability, and how to make the case for evidence-informed policy-making.