Mirja Sjöblom

Mirja Sjöblom is a Senior Economist at the World Bank, advising governments on the governance of health markets and health financing. With over 20 years of experience across Africa, Asia, Europe and Central Asia, and Latin America, she helps countries design reforms that make health systems more sustainable, equitable, and resilient. She currently leads the World Bank’s global work on private sector engagement in health and serves as Senior Economist in the Latin America and Caribbean Region. Earlier in her career, she led World Bank health programs in Poland and Tajikistan and played a key role in establishing the Global Financing Facility (GFF), where she served as Senior Economist and later as Strategic Advisor to the Head of the Secretariat. Mirja holds a Ph.D. in Health Policy from the University of Edinburgh, where her research focused on the governance of health markets, and an M.Sc. in Economics and International Business from the Stockholm School of Economics. She has long been involved in developing the Managing Markets for Health (MM4H) agenda and course, which explores how governments can steer public and private actors toward public-interest goals in increasingly complex health systems. She has published widely on health system performance, gender, and international migration, with a strong focus on translating economic insights into actionable policy.