Sandhya Dilhani Samarasekera

Dr. S. Dilhani Samarasekera, is a Public Health Specialist, Board Certified Consultant Community Physician and a Medical Doctor from Sri Lanka with over 20 years of experience in the field of Public Health. She has obtained her MBBS from Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo in 1998, MSc in Community Medicine from Post Graduate Institute, University of Colombo in 2003 and MD in Community Medicine from Post Graduate Institute, University of Colombo in 2009. She has undergone her post-doctoral training at Institute of Health & Society, Newcastle University, United Kingdom in 2010-2011.

Dr Samarasekera has worked in many public health units including Anti Filariasis Campaign, Rabies Control Programme, National STD/AIDS Control Programme, office of the Medical Officer of Health-Homagama and Quarantine Unit. After becoming the Board-Certified Specialist in Community Medicine in 2010, she was the first Consultant Community Physician posted to Anti Filariasis Campaign (AFC) of Ministry of Health in 2011. She is one of the chief editors of National Documentation on Certification of Elimination of Lymphatic Filariasis in Sri Lanka, which was submitted to WHO to obtain the Certification on Filariasis Elimination in 2016.

Since 2017, Dr Samarasekera is working as the End Post Consultant Community Physician at Quarantine Unit of Ministry of Health where the Quarantine Unit is the Co-National Focal Point of IHR-2005 in Sri Lanka. All the airport and port health offices in international points of entry in Sri Lanka are managed by Quarantine Unit/ Ministry of Health. As the Consultant in Quarantine Unit, she works with several stakeholders to ensure border health security including animal, human, aviation, marine, agriculture, radiation, chemical, security forces and environmental sectors. Technical guidance is given to airport and port health officers.

Dr Samarasekera involves in providing technical guidance to stakeholders and was a member of the local panel involved in Joint External Evaluation in 2017. She was involved in preparation of National Action Plan of Health Security 2019-2023 in Sri Lanka, as well as in other activities related to the application of the WHO IHR Monitoring and Evaluation Framework. She has involved in organising and conducting IHR-PVS National bridging workshop and Strategic Tool for Assessing Risks (STAR) workshop in 2023. She coordinates and involves in filling of State Party Annual Reporting Tool with Stakeholders.

Dr Samarasekera has involved in several research activities, She has represented Sri Lanka in many international forums on Health Security.

During the COVID-19 pandemic she was actively involved in minimizing the risk of transmission among workers and travelers at points of entry. She is a member of in many technical committees such as National Inventory on Dangerous Pathogens, National Steering Committee on IHR, Committee to prepare guidelines on Quarantine Measures for travellers, Committee to prepare guidelines on human remains repatriated to Sri Lanka, Committee on Safe Management of Dead Body in context of COVID-19 and Working group for National Policy on Biosafety and Biosecurity. 

Dr Samarasekera served on the Review Committee  regarding amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005).