Our Team

WHA’s success depends largely on our people, and we attribute our achievements to the outstanding individuals who form our team and to their collective dedication, talent, and commitment. Each member of our team brings unique expertise, skills, and perspectives, and every team member plays a crucial role.  

The various teams at WHA combine skills in business, financial and program management, policy development, planning, negotiation, stakeholder engagement, accounting, communications, information technology and administration. 

If you would like more information about any of the programs or projects managed by WHA, please contact one of the staff members listed below by:

Phone: +61 (2) 9960 6333
Email:
admin@wildlifehealthaustralia.com.au
Postal address: 490 Northbourne Avenue, Canberra, ACT, 2602

Senior Leadership Team
Projects and Programs
Business Unit

Senior Leadership Team

Projects and Programs

Business Unit

Support WHA

Wildlife Health Australia (WHA) leads national action to respond to emerging health issues affecting Australia’s wildlife. Today, you can join us, donate to our conservation projects or follow us to protect our unique and precious wildlife.

koala snuggled with its baby in tree
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Wildlife Health Australia aims to link, inform and support people and organisations who work with or have an interest in wildlife health across Australia through technical advice, facilitation, communications and professional support.

 
Rupert Woods profile
Rupert Woods

Rupe is CEO of WHA. He is a member of the International Association for Public Participation, Governance Institute of Australia, and a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.  Rupe is interested in Australia, people and how good decisions are made. View Rupe’s profile on LinkedIn.

Photo of Tiggy Grillo
Tiggy Grillo

Tiggy is the National Coordinator and COO of Wildlife Health Australia and has been working for the organisation since May 2009. Tiggy obtained her veterinary degree in Glasgow, Scotland in 1999 and returned to Glasgow to complete a PhD in molecular parasitology in 2006. In 2006, Tiggy moved to Australia to work at the then new School of Animal & Veterinary Sciences where she lectured in parasitology and communication skills at Charles Sturt University in Wagga Wagga, NSW. In 2021-2022 she undertook a part-time secondment with WOAH to support WOAH's Wildlife Health Framework. Tiggy was the recipient of the Wildlife Diseases Association Australasian Section Barry Munday Award for her outstanding services to wildlife health in Australia. She enjoys connecting people through positive, mutually beneficial partnerships. 

Tiggy is Australia's World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) Focal Point for Wildlife Health and Co-Chair of the IUCN SSC Wildlife Health Specialist Group (IUCN WHSG). 

Karen Magee Profile
Kaz Magee

As Business Manager, Kaz acts as the chief administrative officer in the organisation.  Kaz acts as Public Officer/Secretary, and with a focus on governance  provides guidence to the Board on corporate law regulations and the organisation's constitution, encompassing rules, regulations, and bylaws.  Her role includes: 

  • Advising the Board on corporate governance principles and plans, and implementation of corporate governance programs.
  • Communicating the instructions of the Board, assisting in the implementation of corporate strategies and giving practical effect to the Board’s decisions.
  • Leadership of the Business Unit, encompassing Administration, Marketing, Communications, HR,  IT, Finance, and Legal, ensuring smooth operations across these crucial areas.
Keren Cox-Witton profile
Keren Cox-Witton

Keren's role is Program Manager - Surveillance. She is a veterinarian who has been working for Wildlife Health Australia since September 2010. She is a University of Sydney graduate and has completed a Graduate Diploma in Applied Science (Wildlife Health & Population Management) and study units in veterinary & wildlife epidemiology. Keren started her career as a small animal veterinarian in Canberra and Sydney. After 6 years in private practice, she moved into the animal health industry where she worked in a variety of technical roles. In 2010 she followed her interest in wildlife health and began working for WHA. In 2018, Keren was recognised with an Australian Biosecurity Award for her work to protect Australian bats against a fungal disease known as white-nose syndrome.

Simone Vitali Profile
Simone Vitali

Simone is a veterinarian who joined Wildilfe Health Australia in July 2022 as Program Manager - Emergencies. She graduated from Murdoch University in 1990, working in mixed practice before returning to Murdoch to complete her PhD.  Simone joined Perth Zoo in 1997 and was the zoo’s Senior Veterinarian from 2004-2021. She has been involved in many wildlife veterinary conservation projects, including in situconservation work with Carnaby’s cockatoo, brush-tailed bettong, Christmas Island blue-tailed skink, Australian sea lion and Sumatran orangutan. She is a member of the Australia and New Zealand College of Veterinary Scientists in Medicine of Zoo Animals. As a Senior Project Officer with the WA State government, Simone provided strategic and procedural support for a range of wildlife emergencies, including oiled wildlife, bushfires, cetacean strandings and entanglements and emergency diseases.  Simone was Project Lead for the National Koala Disease Risk Analysis project, the first national-level DRA undertaken for a native Australian species

Photo of Steve Unwin
Steve Unwin

Steve joined Wildlife Health Australia in April 2022 as the Program Manager - One Health Surveillance and Wildlife Collaborating Centre for Australia and the Indo-Pacific. Steve graduated from Massey University in New Zealand in ecology and veterinary science. He has worked as a wildlife clinician in several zoos, wildlife rehabilitation centres and conservation projects in Australia, Thailand, Cameroon and UK, and academia in the UK. Steve is a European specialist in Zoo Health Management and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy in the UK. He has coordinated international, multidisciplinary wildlife health networks in Africa and South-East Asia.

As a systems thinker in the One Health space, Steve aims to mitigate adverse environmental health impacts from human activity at the human-wildlife interface in the Indo-Pacific region through interdisciplinary research, capacity development and effective networked risk management. Steve’s research interests focus on wildlife infectious diseases, especially zoonoses, disease risk analysis and mental health of wildlife health practitioners. 
 
View Steve’s profile on Linked In

Jo Walker profile
Jo Walker

Joanne (Jo) joined Wildlife Health Australia in January 2023 as the Program Manager – Capacity Building. Jo is a graduate of Flinders University with Doctorate and Masters in Public Health. Her doctoral thesis explored the nexus between ecological public health and sustainability in rural communities in Australia. Jo has over twenty years of experience in the health sector. She started her career as a Registered Nurse and Midwife before moving into management, research, policy development and advocacy roles. Jo aims to apply her extensive experience in health promotion and capacity building programs to increasing awareness, collaboration and coordination and building partnerships and networks in the One Health space.

Clare Death profile
Clare Death

Clare works as a Senior Project Officer and began with Wildlife Health Australia in March 2021. Clare completed her Bachelor of Veterinary Science at The University of Queensland in 2001 and then worked in mixed and small animal practice before completing her Masters of Conservation Medicine at Murdoch University in 2008, which included a research project investigating pharmacokinetics in wombats. In 2015, Clare completed her PhD at The University of Melbourne on industrial fluoride toxicosis in marsupials. Following this, she gained membership to the Australian and New Zealand College of Veterinary Scientists in veterinary epidemiology and spent four years in federal and state government agricultural policy and regulation roles. More recently, Clare has been working in toxicology and risk assessment focused environmental consulting, and as a research associate on various ongoing wildlife disease projects at The University of Melbourne.

Claire Harrison profile
Claire Harrison

Claire is a veterinarian who has recently joined Wildlife Health Australia in the role of Senior Project Officer in April 2022. She is a University of Sydney vet graduate and has also completed a Bachelor of Science and Master of Applied Science (Wildlife Health & Population Management). Claire began her wildlife career as part of local and international in-situ conservation programs and before joining WHA she worked in state government animal biosecurity with a focus on wildlife, surveillance and emergency response.

Andrea Reiss profile
Andrea Reiss

Andrea is a veterinarian who works as a Senior Project Officer at Wildlife Health Australia and joined the team in January 2016. After graduating from Sydney University, Andrea completed a veterinary residency at Melbourne Zoo, gaining a Masters in Zoo and Wildlife Medicine. Andrea has over 17 years experience working as a clinical vet in Australia’s major zoos, including Perth, Taronga and Melbourne Zoos and is a member of the Australian College of Veterinary Scientists in Medicine of Australasian Wildlife. She has been involved in a wide variety of wildlife and conservation programs both within Australia and overseas, including in situ conservation programs for the endangered northern hairy nosed wombat, brush-tailed bettong, eastern barred bandicoot and African painted dog. Andrea recently lead a collaborative research project to investigate the potential role of disease in small mammal population declines in Northern Australia.

Paul Eden

Paul joined Wildlife Health Australia in 2024 in the role of Senior Project Officer, bringing with him over 20 years of clinical experience as a zoo and wildlife veterinarian. Paul has worked across a range of threatened species recovery programs, provided extensive support for wildlife rescue and rehabilitation, and contributed to various research programs to extend existing knowledge on wildlife health and disease matters.  Paul graduated from the University of Melbourne Veterinary School in 1997, working in a range of practices in Australia and the United Kingdom. In 2002, Paul completed his Masters of Science in Wild Animal Health (Zoological Society of London and Royal Veterinary College), conducting a research project exploring the impacts of lead exposure on haematological parameters in reintroduced red kites. Paul's interests include veterinary support of threatened species recovery programs, wildlife disease risk assessment processes, and the role of wildlife rehabilitation in the One Health sphere.

Silvia Ban profile
Silvia Ban

Silvia is a veterinarian from Brazil who joined Wildlife Health Australia in the role of Project Officer in May 2016. After graduating, she has coordinated an array of database projects and has also a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration. Following her interest in wildlife health and conservation, she concluded a Masters of Wildlife Health and Population Management at The University of Sydney. Her research project was on coccidiosis in green turtles. Silvia has also consolidated risks and mitigation strategies of feeding wild birds in Australia, and she is thrilled to work in a multi-stakeholder environment that improves wildlife disease management.

Shana Ahmed profile
Shana Ahmed

Shana began working for Wildlife Health Australia in January 2023 as a Project Officer in the Wildlife Disease Surveillance team. She graduated from the University of Adelaide with a Bachelor of Animal Science and completed postgraduate studies in Conservation Biology at Macquarie University. Shana has worked in South Australia and New South Wales in a variety of fields including eco-tourism, bush regeneration, and environmental education. Prior to WHA she spent three years working in wildlife rescue and rehabilitation and hopes to continue championing the work of wildlife volunteers and professionals to make a positive impact to wildlife health in Australia.

Erin Davis profile
Erin Davis

Erin is a veterinarian who joined Wildlife Health Australia in February 2023 as a Project Officer- One Health Surveillance and Wildlife Collaborating Centre for Australia and the Indo-Pacific. She is completing a Master of Veterinary Conservation Medicine through Murdoch University, including a research dissertation on marine turtle health and rehabilitation outcomes. Erin started her career as a small animal veterinarian, working in Canberra, Brisbane, and Sydney, and spent time volunteering at Taronga Zoo. After 10 years in clinical practice, she moved into a federal government veterinary officer role, working in animal disease preparedness and response, managing vector projects, and engaging in animal health and disease preparedness capacity building in neighbouring countries.

Lauren Bassett profile
Lauren Bassett

Lauren joined Wildlife Health Australia in February 2023 as a Project Support Officer. Lauren completed her Bachelor of Animal and Veterinary Bioscience, majoring in Wildlife Conservation and Management in 2019. Before joining WHA, Lauren worked for almost 2 years as a research assistant with the University of Sydney, organising and developing a range of wildlife disease and conservation research projects. She has experience working with a variety of stakeholders and organisations focused on wildlife rehabilitation, research, and conservation.

Joe Cashmore profile
Joe Cashmore

Joe joined the Wildlife Health Australia team in October 2022 in the role of Project Support Officer. Joe has come from a background in environmental sciences and communications, completing a Bachelor in Environmental Science (Wildlife and Conservation Biology) at Deakin University and undertaking post graduate study in Strategic Communications at La Trobe University 2021. 

Before joing WHA, Joe spent four years in state wide wildlife emergency response management and has worked in leading conservation bodies in science communication, advocacy and community outreach. 

Joe also brings to the role his strong technical background with experience in database management and analytics, and website administration.   

Trish Hennessy-Hawks profile
Trish Hennessy-Hawks

Trish is currently the Head of Administration, People and Culture at WHA has been part of the organisation since 2018. She graduated from Macquarie University with a Bachelor of Business Administration. Prior to Trish joining WHA, she was the Live Scheduling Manager at a captioning company within the media industry. Trish enjoys all things operational within an organisation and is focused on seamless administration, employee wellbeing and assisting the Business Manager as needed. She is passionate about helping those around her and is the first point of contact for all WHA members, stakeholders and the public.

Lisa Keen profile
Lisa Keen

Lisa is the Communications Coordinator at WHA. She is a communications professional who has worked in public and private practice, for NGOs, not-for-profits and state and federal governments. She has tertiary qualifications in professional communications and Australian history and politics. Her early work with the Australian Defence Force enabled public information activities to be supported from national and overseas deployments, United Nations missions and conflict zones. Her more recent work has highlighted the plight of threatened species in Australia and around the world, and engendered public understanding and support. Lisa has provided services to Wildlife Health Australia for several years, and was proud to join the team officially in 2019.

Emma Holme profile
Emma Holme

Emma is the Marketing Coordinator for WHA and joined the team in March 2023.  After graduating from the University of Cape Town with a Business Science degree she started her career working for Nestle in the UK on their graduate training scheme.  She worked in their marketing department for 8 years in a variety of brand management roles across their Nescafe portfolio.  Following this, she moved to South Africa where she worked on a consultative basis for small entrepreneurial and medium sized national companies.  Projects included strategic brand reviews, commercialisation strategies for new product launches and general brand management.  Emma moved to Australia with her family in 2022 and began working at WHA the following year.  Her role focuses on working with the team to market and promote the valuable work done by WHA.

Phil Tucak profile
Phil Tucak

Phil has been working for Wildlife Health Australia since 2021 as our Science Communication Advisor. Phil is a veterinarian, science communicator and communications manager with a career interest in wildlife conservation and science communication. He also works as the Science Communication Manager for the Office of the Chief Veterinary Officer at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, as a science communicator for several veterinary businesses, and part-time in clinical veterinary practice. Phil is a member of the IUCN's Species Survival Commission - Conservation Planning Specialist Group, and co-curated their online training course in Wildlife Disease Risk Analysis. As the Wildlife Outreach Vet, Phil also works to share the conversation about conservation, and enjoys involvement in wildlife conservation projects across Australia and internationally, including previously having worked on a seal research study in Antarctica. During his career Phil has previously worked as the Communications Manager for the Australian Wildlife Conservancy, as the Communications and Interpretation Coordinator for Perth Zoo, as a multi-media journalist for SBS News, and as a television producer and presenter, and radio producer for the ABC. Phil has previously taught wildlife handling skills to undergraduate veterinary students at Murdoch University, and produced the national ‘Our Place’ Indigenous radio program for the Centre for Appropriate Technology.