Dr. Meena Dawar is a Medical Health Officer with Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) and is responsible for the immunization, tobacco and Healthy Schools programs at a regional level. She is also a Clinical Associate Professor with the School of Population and Public Health at the University of British Columbia.
 
She received her MD from Dalhousie University; completed her Family Medicine training at Queen’s University and her Master’s in Health Sciences and Public Health Residency Training at UBC. 

Dr. Dawar is passionate about immunization practice, having started her career as an immunizing family physician in Ontario and B.C. Her public health career has focused on prevention and control of vaccine preventable disease outbreaks, advancing immunization policy in B.C., and collaborative implementation of routine, seasonal and new immunization programs for health authority residents. This includes working with public health and community partners in offering quality service and improving immunization coverage through peer education, addressing barriers to access, increasing parental engagement with school immunization program, building community trust with routine and new vaccines, and supporting vaccine safety surveillance. She has specifically focused on improving acceptance of the HPV vaccine and recovery of the school immunization program following the COVID-19 pandemic.

Prior to working at Vancouver Coastal, Dr. Dawar was privileged to work with First Nations communities in B.C., Ontario, as well as immunization program activities overseas.