Ayesha Verrall: Infectious Diseases Physician

Dr Ayesha Verrall is an Infectious Diseases Physician and Senior Lecturer with Otago Medical School. She became a household name in New Zealand in early 2020 when she was asked by the Government to review their existing Covid-19 contact tracing strategy. She didn’t hold back with her criticism, and the implementation of her contact tracing recommendations was key in relaxing restrictions in NZ. Ayesha’s specialty area is in fact in Tuberculosis and she has lived and worked in Indonesia and Singapore before returning home to New Zealand. She's now considering a career change into politics, and is on the Labour Party List for the Sept 2020 election.

"It's really amazing to be able to work with people, patients when they're ill. And obviously there's some sad parts to that, but there's also some really fulfilling parts. And most of the time if I meet a patient with a serious infection in hospital, they recover and I see them in a month or two in my clinic looking so much better. So usually you're part of helping people through a really difficult time or a crisis in their life and helping them get better."