Professor Sophia Chan

Biography

Professor Sophia Chan is currently Senior Advisor to the President’s Office at the University of Hong Kong, and Professor and Director of the University of Hong Kong Primary Health Care Academy (HKU PHCA).

Professor Chan was appointed by the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China as Under Secretary for Food and Health (USFH) from 2012 to 2017, and Secretary for Food and Health (SFH) from 2017 to 2022. She was the first nurse in Hong Kong appointed in this ministerial position. She has led the Food and Health Bureau (FHB) in making a remarkable contribution in the formulation and implementation of various major policies on health, food and environmental hygiene and agriculture and fisheries. During her tenure as SFH, not only has she been fighting the COVID-19 pandemic for over 2.5 years, she has also made exemplary efforts and policy initiatives in protecting and promoting the health of the population through health care reform and started a new journey in primary health care (PHC) by establishing territory wide District Health Centres (DHCs) in all 18 districts in Hong Kong, and completed a PHC Blueprint for development. She also laid a strong foundation of developing the first Chinese Medicine Hospital, opened the first Children's Hospital, launched the Hong Kong Cancer Strategy 2018, launched the Towards 2025: Strategy and Action Plan to Prevent and Control Non-communicable Diseases in Hong Kong, implemented the Hong Kong Strategy and Action Plan on Anti-Microbial Resistance 2017-2022 and prepared the 2023-2027 Strategy Plan, established the HK Genome Research Institute, launched the Voluntary Health Insurance Scheme, launched the Voluntary Scheme for Advanced Practice Nursing under the Hong Kong Nursing Council, and banned E-cigarettes and Alternative Smoking Products in Hong Kong.

Before the Government of the HKSAR appointment, Professor Chan was the Head of Department of Nursing Studies/School of Nursing of HKU from 2000 to 2011 and an Assistant Dean of the LKS Faculty of Medicine of HKU from 2001 to 2012. Professor Chan was trained in and practised general and paediatric nursing in Hong Kong and London. She got her Master of Education from the University of Manchester, Master of Public Health from the Harvard University School of Public Health, and her Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Hong Kong.

Professor Chan is one of the leading Nurse Scientists locally and internationally and was named among the world’s top 2% most cited scientists in her specialty areas by Stanford University in 2020 and 2021. Her research specialises in public health, management of tobacco dependency, prevention of second-hand smoke exposure in children, and building primary health care (PHC) system and developing innovative PHC models, and policy development research. She has always been the top-funded researcher in HKU School of Nursing and has led many external competitive grants including GRF, HMRF, and commissioned grants from the Government, Hong Kong Jockey Club and key foundations and organisations locally and internationally. She is a pioneer and founding director of several signature research and training programmes in tobacco dependency therapeutic interventions, primary health care, and nursing leadership development. She developed and tested various novel smoking cessation models through individual and clustered randomised controlled trials and compare ethno-cultural differences between Chinese and other smokers through epidemiological and social science methodologies. She proposes novel scientific insights and has published extensively with over 240 peer-reviewed scientific papers with more than 3,800 citations. Her research findings have not only transformed smoking cessation services and tobacco control policies but also making significant impact to enhance the health of our public.

Since she resumed her professoriate position in HKU in July 2022, she has already obtained five major donations to fund community-based research projects in promoting healthy ageing, testing effective primary health care models, protecting children from second-hand smoke (SHS) exposure, and nursing leadership development. With a generous donation from the HKU Endowment fund, she set up the HKU Primary Health Care Academy aiming to support and align with the HK Government’s PHC reform in Hong Kong. She currently serves as Director and Principal Investigator of the Generations Connect Project, the HKU Primary Health Care Academy, Quit-for-Kids, and leading two new major research projects funded by the Hong Kong Jockey Club on DATAZONE Primary Health Care and HKU JC Nursing Leadership Development Fellowship.