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Dr. Joan Benach is Senior Researcher, Director of the Health Inequalities Research Group -­‐ Employment Conditions Network (GREDS-­‐EMCONET), and Associate Professor of Public Health and Occupational Health in the Department of Political and Social Sciences (Section Sociology) at the Pompeu Fabra University (Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain). He has appointments at the Johns Hopkins University (Baltimore, US), the University of Toronto (Toronto, Canada), and the University of Alberta (Edmonton, Canada). Dr. Benach has a varied academic background that includes a MD, a MPH, and a degree in Preventive Medicine and Public Health in the Autonomous University of Barcelona. He studied Contemporary History in the Autonomous University of Barcelona, Methodology of Social Sciences in the University of Barcelona, Health Policy in the University of California at Berkeley (US), and obtained a PhD in Public Health (Health Policy) in the Johns Hopkins University.

For over two decades, Joan Benach has collaborated extensively with leading social epidemiologists, public health experts, members of social movements, unions, and other social groups in Catalonia, Spain, the European Union, North and Latin America, and other regions of the world. He has been consultant to the WHO and Ministries of Health of countries such as Spain, Chile and Bolivia, having participated in numerous Scientific Commissions. For example, between 1993 and 1996 carried out the Spanish Black Report on Health Inequalities commissioned by the Spanish Ministry of Health. Between 2005 and 2008 worked for the WHO Commission on Social Determinants of Health chairing the Employment Conditions Knowledge Network (EMCONET) that published the Report "Employment, Work, and Health Inequalities: a Global Perspective" (later on published as a book). In 2010 participated in the working committees that developed the Report "Fair Society, Healthy Lives" (Marmot Review), and in the Scientific Commission on Social Determinants of Health Inequalities in Spain.

Main research contributions of Dr. Benach include original analyses on Social Determinants of Health Inequalities such as Precarious Employment and other Employment Conditions, the health intersections between Social Class, Gender, Migration and Geography, and the development of Health Policy analysis and methods. Dr. Benach has lead many research projects in Europe, Latin America and elsewhere, and has given numerous presentations, seminars, and courses on the aforementioned subjects. He also has extensively developed many Knowledge Transfer (KT) activities including the publication of books and reports on Social Determinants in Health Inequalities (Spain: 1996, 2011; Catalonia: 2003, 2005), and Small-­‐Area mortality Atlases (Spain: 2001, 2012; Catalonia: 2005). He has over 200 publications on these and other public health topics. Other examples of his KT activities include the publication of books for lay people such as "Learning how to look at health: how social inequalities damage our health" (2005), or "Health Care is for Sale" (2012), both in Spanish, as well as abundant interventions in the mass media.