The Team

Marc Mendelson

​Director

Marc Mendelson trained in Medicine at St Mary’s Hospital London and undertook his PhD at Cambridge University before completing Infectious Diseases training at Addenbrookes Hospital Cambridge and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. His postgraduate studies were at The Rockefeller University in New York before moving to University of Cape Town (UCT) in 2001 to work on tuberculosis and innate immunity. In 2007, he started the Division of Infectious Diseases and HIV Medicine at UCT, where he is a full Professor and Head. He was the founding co-chair of the South African Antibiotic Stewardship Programme and has chaired the Ministerial Advisory Committee on Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) since 2014.

Marc’s focus is on national and international policy in relation to AMR. He serves on the WHO’s Expert Advisory Panel on Drug Evaluation, the WHO Essential Medicines List Antibiotic Working Group, and multiple WHO Technical Advisory Panels and Guideline Development Groups on AMR and COVID-19. He is chair of the Vivli Open Access Antimicrobial Data Program’s Scientific Advisory Group, a member of the GARDP’s scientific advisory committee, the G20 AMR Hub Stakeholders’ Group, and has worked with Wellcome Trust and the World Economic Forum on issues relating to AMR. Marc is Principal Investigator of the Cape Town Hub of the Centre for Antibiotic Optimisation (CAMO)-Network.

Marc has held the office of Presidency of the Infectious Diseases Society of Southern Africa, the Federation of Infectious Diseases Societies of Southern Africa (FIDSSA), and the International Society for Infectious Diseases. In 2021, he became a Fellow of the Royal Society of South Africa, and was made an honorary life member of FIDSSA in recognition of services to Infectious Diseases.

Louise is passionate about social impact and has worked in the university and charity sector in impact-driven roles for 16 years.

Between 2010-2023, Louise worked at King’s College London, and delivered a range of initiatives that amplified the social impact of the university in collaboration with students, staff, and a wide range of partners. She is a Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Policy Institute at King’s College London.

Her interests lie in both setting up and delivering initiatives that meet global challenges, and how to measure social impact, and she has worked across a range of issues such as forced displacement, women’s leadership, global health and international development. Her current focus at the Trinity Challenge is antimicrobial resistance in low- and middle- income countries.

From 2008-2010, Louise worked in community development for a social enterprise in Malawi. Louise has a BA in Geography and a MSc in International Poverty Reduction and Development Management from the University of Birmingham.

Charlie Alderwick

Head of Communications and Engagement

Charlie has a background in communications strategy, media and stakeholder relations and content creation, and joins the Trinity Challenge from BCW (Burson, Cohn and Wolf) one of the world’s largest communications agencies. At BCW they sat within the healthcare team and led mainly on disease awareness campaigns, sustainability communications and patient engagement work for clients including the European Institute of Innovation & Technology, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk and Boehringer Ingelheim.

Prior to this Charlie has mainly worked in the third sector, having spent three years as Communications Manager at NAT (National AIDS Trust), the UK’s leading HIV policy charity, during which time they oversaw communications and media engagement during a number of key strategic victories including the charity’s litigation against NHS England to secure access to the HIV prevention drug PrEP.

Charlie has worked and volunteered for a number of other charities, including Friends of the Earth and the Citizen’s Advice Bureau and currently sits on the Board of Trustees for Mosaic LGBT+ Young Person’s Trust.

Charlie has an MA in Journalism from Goldsmiths, and a BA in English Language and Literature from the University of Oxford.

Hamish Morrow

Project Manager

As Project Manager, Hamish is responsible for overseeing and ensuring the successful delivery of The Trinity Challenge on Antimicrobial Resistance. He coordinates the efforts of the team, winners, and wider Challenge network to meet the project’s objectives – building towards the High Level Meeting at the 2024 United Nations General Assembly.

Hamish has extensive experience managing complex and ambitious operations, with a background in the culture and creative sectors. As Operations Director at the charity the Pleasance Theatre Trust, he was responsible for planning the largest operation at world’s biggest open access arts festival, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Here he oversaw an annual programme of over 260 international producers and led a youth development programme involving 300 aspiring arts practitioners. As an arts consultant Hamish has supported a range of organisations across multiple disciplines including strategic planning, financial management, mentorship and partnerships.

With a 1st honour bachelor’s degree from the University of Westminster, Hamish is currently based in his native Scotland.

Hamish is passionate about delivering creative, accessible, and impactful projects.

Jennie Smith

Communications & Events Manager

jennie spent the first 10 years of her career working in the NHS. Responsible for engagement, communications and events across a number of national and local programmes. The last 5 years were spent in Primary Care Digital Transformation, supporting primary care Nurses to learn more about digital services for their patients. After the pandemic she moved to Brussels and took on a digital engagement role with the European Green Party working with MEPs and Green parties across Europe.

Since then she started a business supporting progressive organisations with communications, events and technology. Working on projects such as creating a digital platform for Amnesty International and delivering the Global Greens Congress in South Korea.

She is passionate about environmentalism, global health and social justice.