Jim McManus is Executive Director of Public Health for Hertfordshire and President of the UK Association of Directors of Public Health. He has worked in local government, the third sector, the NHS and commercial sector. He is an Hon Professor at the University of Hertfordshire and an Honorary Vice-President of the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health. He has been a commissioner and public heath lead on addictions, sexual health, drugs, cardiac and stroke care and primary care. He has been SRO for the Hertfordshire and West Essex ICS Population Health Management Programme. His interests are systems wide approaches to reducing inequalities. He is currently co-chair of the national co-design group for the new Health Protection System for England.

Jim was a Health Foundation Generation Q Fellow. He is a Chartered Psychologist, Chartered Scientist, Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, Registered Public Health Specialist, Fellow of the British Psychological Society, and Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. He has been policy lead for ADPH on drugs and alcohol, public mental health and sexual health. On behalf of ADPH he is a Member of the Steering Group for the NIHR Policy Research Unit at the University of Newcastle, a Member of the Advisory Group for the Public Mental Health Implementation Centre, Royal College of Psychiatrists and a Member of the Oversight Group for the National HIV Action Plan. He was a co-author of the national strategy on behavioural sciences and public health.

Jim is one of a pool of leadership mentors for new DsPH and provides leadership training for people aspiring to practitioner registration with the UK Public Health Register. In 2011 he was awarded the Good Samaritan Medal for Excellence in Healthcare by Pope Benedict XVI, the highest honour for healthcare the Vatican can award. Outside work he is a Trustee of St Joseph’s Hospice, Hackney.