Nojus Saad

Bio

Nojus Saad, MD, is a physician-entrepreneur and digital health diplomat dedicated to engineering health justice through scalable digital systems. As a Technical Advisor to the World Health Organization (WHO), he co-develops global adolescent health indicators adopted by the World Bank, UNFPA, and UN H6+ Partners. His leadership in rural and LMIC communities across Iraq, India, and France is anchored by his role as Founder of the Youth For Women Foundation, where he has spearheaded 45 youth-led initiatives directly impacting the lives of 18,500 women and young people.

Dr. Saad’s diplomatic expertise spans health and security, serving as UN Youth Ambassador for Disarmament and Biosecurity (UNODA) and as the MENA Youth Lead for the Swiss-based DTH-Lab. Through these mandates, he has mobilized coalitions across 12 MENA countries to integrate digital innovation into national health agendas. This high-level advocacy is validated by his track record as a systems architect; in 2021, he orchestrated a digital health literacy and COVID-19 misinformation initiative for rural and displaced populations. By building the digital capacity of NGO leaders and youth, he empowered grassroots networks to execute 15 targeted awareness campaigns, reaching 10,000 women and youth to strengthen their access to reliable health services.

Currently, Dr. Saad is scaling this success into a coordinated, all-in-one digital platform that bridges Iraq’s public and private healthcare sectors. By implementing interoperable EHRs and data-driven matching, his startup digitizes the entire referral pathway to connect Iraqi patients with the most cost-effective, high-quality care providers both domestically and abroad in the U.S. and France. This venture transforms fragmented systems into a seamless, unified framework for optimized clinical access and specialist care.

A Knight-Hennessy Scholar and advisor to Lady Gaga’s Born This Way Foundation, Dr. Saad holds an MD with executive diplomatic training from the Karolinska Institute and Stockholm School of Economics. At Stanford MCiM, he is refining the technical and managerial frameworks necessary to lead the next generation of inclusive, tech-driven health systems in LMICs.

Honors & Awards

• Knight-Hennessy Scholar, Stanford University
• Kofi Annan Changemaker, United Nations Geneva & Kofi Annan Foundation
• Dalai Lama Fellow, University of Virginia, Stanford University, University of Boulder Colorado
• Advisory Board Member, Lady Gaga's Born This Way Foundation
• One Young World Ambassador, Reckitt Benckiser Group
• Advisory Panel Member, Masachussetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Solve
• Technical Reviewer, The Second Lancet Commission on Adolescent Health & Wellbeing
• ICANN Fellow, Digital Governance & Policy, Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, ICANN

Professional Affiliations and Activities

• Technical Advisor, Global Adolescent Health Measurement, World Health Organization (2024 - Present)
• Founder, President & CEO, Youth For Women Foundation (2018 - Present)
• Executive Producer & Global Ambassador, TOXSICK Film (2025 - Present)
• UN Ambassador for Youth in Disarmament and Biosecurity, United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs (2024 - 2025)
• Youth Advisor to Executive Leadership, UN Office for Project Services (2024 - 2025)
• Regional Ambassador, MENA, Digital Transformations for Health Lab (2026 - Present)