Our Mission is Newborn Health

Dr. Steve Wall is a pediatrician, neonatologist, and public health expert with over 20 years’ experience in global health at Save the Children.  He trained in Pediatrics and Neonatology at University of California, San Francisco and Harvard, where he also received a Master of Science degree in Epidemiology.  Prior to joining Save the Children, Dr. Wall was on the Faculty of Pediatrics at the University of Chicago and worked as an Attending Neonatologist at the University Children’s Hospital. Dr. Wall is recognized as a global technical expert and has served on expert panels for WHO in developing global guidelines for many areas of newborn health. He has authored over 50 peer-reviewed publications as well as a number of global reports and publications such as Born Too Soon, and the KMC Global Positioning Paper and KMC Implementation Framework Paper.

Dr. Mazia  has over 30 years of experience in the health care field as a provider and administration in Colombia, South America, and the Negev desert of Israel; and 14 years as a public health practitioner and global technical leader in the field of child health, with a specific focus on newborn health. Her parents are Holocaust survivors from Poland and arrived in Colombia as refugees in 1947 where they began their family and raised three children. She has a medical degree from Rosario University Bogota, specialized training in neonatology from Soroka Medical Center, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, and a master’s degree in public health from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Mazia is fluent in Spanish, English, and Hebrew, and has basic in French and Portuguese language skills.

Dr. Neena Khadka Basnet, a pediatrician with over 30 years of experience in clinical and public health practices, began her career in 1987 with the Ministry of Health and Population (MoHP) in Nepal.  She practiced pediatrics and neonatology clinically for fifteen years in tertiary and zonal hospitals in the country.  During her tenure with the MoHP, she also served for three years as the in-charge of national child health training activities in the government’s National Health Training Center.  Dr. Khadka Basnet joined Save the Children in 2001 on the Saving Newborn Lives Program-I.  During her tenure with Save the Children in Nepal, Neena also led the Community Health Service Delivery team for the USAID bilateral program in Nepal. In 2013 she became a member of the Save the Children USA team and served as the Team Lead for Newborn Health for USAID’s Maternal and Child Survival Program.  Dr. Khadka Basnet is currently the Lead Newborn Advisor at Save the Children USA and the Newborn Health Focal Point for USAID’s MOMENTUM Country and Global Leadership Program. She holds M.B.,B.S., Diploma in Child Health, M.A. in Social Science Research and MPH from various universities in Asia.

Hilary Wartinger, MPH (she/her) leads the management team behind HNN, providing strategic direction and content oversight. She previously worked for the Women’s Refugee Commission as a Sexual and Reproductive Health advisor, where she focused on reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, adolescent health and nutrition programming in conflict settings. Her work in humanitarian settings brought her to Bangladesh, Nigeria, and Somalia, where she developed pilot testing protocols for the Newborn Health in Humanitarian Settings Field Guide. Additionally, Hilary has led content development for a New York-based non-profit’s website. Hilary is a returned Peace Corps Volunteer, serving three years in Eswatini before earning a Master’s in Public Health from Columbia University, alongside her degrees in Journalism and International Relations from Boston University.