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Adrienne Parrish Fuentes recently joined Thermo Fisher Scientific as the first Global Health Policy Director where she is responsible for engaging governments and other stakeholders to advance innovative partnerships and solutions to challenging global health problems. Adrienne is an experienced global health diplomat and foreign affairs professional who most recently represented the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as the Health Attaché to China from October 2016 through March 2021. In this role, she led the HHS team in China and advised the Secretary of HHS and the US Ambassador to China on priority health policy issues between the two countries, including pandemic preparedness, mental health and substance abuse, global health security, biomedical research, and food and medical product safety. In addition to her government counterpart responsibilities, Adrienne built relationships with multilateral organizations, foundations, associations, and private sector entities active in health policy, healthcare and biomedical research in China. During the COVID-19 outbreak and ensuing global health crisis, Adrienne served as part of the senior leadership team at the US Embassy in Beijing managing multiple concurrent crises.

Prior to her time with HHS, Adrienne served at the U.S. Department of State in various capacities from 2002 to 2008, holding roles with the Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator and the Office of the Director of Foreign Assistance, as well as serving on the Deputy Secretary’s staff. In these roles she was primarily responsible for public affairs and communication, program management, strategy development, budget planning and execution, launching new initiatives, and training and facilitation. From 2008 through 2013 she was the Country Coordinator for the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) at the U.S. Embassy in Abuja, Nigeria and later served in the same role at the U.S. Embassy in Windhoek, Namibia. In these roles, Adrienne was responsible for leading diverse teams to expand access to lifesaving HIV prevention, treatment and care services and she built partnerships across governments, multilateral institutions, and civil society organizations in order to achieve these goals.

Adrienne has previous experience in the private consulting sector in the fields of health communication, energy security, and defense and national security policy. She holds an M.P.A. from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and a B.A. in International Relations and Japanese Studies from the University of Pennsylvania.