The panel members all live or work in south London, with backgrounds across the nine characteristics protected under the Equality Act 2010. The panel has been set up to ensure that diverse communities can share their experiences of the pandemic, including issues of inequity and discrimination and feed directly into our Covid research within the ARC. It will be chaired by Dr Josephine Ocloo, the diversity and inclusion lead for the ARC, supported by Clare Coultas, in her role in the ARC public health theme.

Our panel members (and some of the wider ARC team) attended their first panel meeting on the 21st January and are introduced below:

  1. Jane Hopkins – former psychiatric (forensic) social worker, who is visually impaired and in her 70s, currently involved in the health and social care sector working as a lay advisor in NHS committees, ‘task and finish’ groups and working parties and involved in patient and public involvement (PPI) on research projects at King’s College London and University College London.
  2. Clive Alan Moore-Ceaton – lived experience of cancer, involved in PPI on research projects
  3. Katherine Barrett – involved in SLaM and King’s College London work as an expert by experience
  4. Rashmi Kumar Agrawal – trustee of Lambeth Patients and Public Participation Group (PPG), actively engaging with Primary Care Networks
  5. Smarajit Roy – director and trustee of Community Support Network South London and a member of King’s Improvement Science and the Centre for Implementation Science projects, previously carried out a PhD.
  6. Clara Martin De Barros – PPI representative since 2016, mature student and activist.
  7. Agnes Agyepong – head of engagement at Best Beginnings, Chair of Maternity Voices Partnership (MVP) at Guy’s and St Thomas Hospital, school governor, founder of ‘The GLOMAMA awards’, on the NIHR ARC Maternity and Perinatal Mental Health PPI Strategy Committee, a founding member of the Maternity Mental Health South East London steering group and a Healthwatch Lewisham committee member
  8. Chris Pavlakis – creative practitioner with lived experience, working in the nexus arts and well-being
  9. Leah Bedward – abuela doula, social worker, energy and wellness coach and intersectional womanist
  10. Vita Moltedo – co-founder member of Maternity Voices Matter a group bridging the gap between mothers and maternity care, striving to amplify the voices of seldom heard and minority groups.
  11. Rachael Buabeng – multi-award winning 'mumpreneur', author, MVP co-chair and founder of community group ‘Mummy’s Day Out’ and founder of a network for mothers who have or have survived hyperemesis gravidarum (a rare condition causing severe nausea and vomiting in pregnancy).
  12. Leah Noel – magistrate, delivering programmes in central government for over ten years. She also worked on two published papers regarding breakthrough treatments she has piloted.
  13. Lana Samuels - a long term patient and public involvement member formerly working with the CLAHRC South London (antimicrobial theme) and currently working with ARC South London in applied informatics and other areas such as developing the patient and public involvement (PPIE) strategy.

Members of the panel will be involved in the NIHR ARC South London’s ‘Inside Research” seminar series on the 17 of February from 6-7:30pm and will contribute to the discussions about research being conducted within the ARC on the pandemic. Find out more about the event