Igor Grabovac honored at Leadership Excellence Awards in Research

Igor Grabovac, a specialist in Public Health at MedUni Vienna, was awarded second place in the Ludwig Boltzmann Society's inaugural Leadership Excellence Award in Research. It recognized his "commitment to emphatic leadership and to diversity and inclusion as sources of enrichment." This year, for the first time, the Career Center of the Ludwig Boltzmann Gesellschaft (LBG) has established an award for domestic leaders in research and science: the Leadership Excellence Award in Research (LExA). LExA is intended to recognize outstanding leadership skills that make significant contributions to solving societal challenges and thus also serve as role models for young researchers. The first award ceremony took place on September 27, 2023, together with Federal Minister for Education, Science and Research Martin Polaschek at the Leopold Museum in Vienna. The work of Igor Grabovac and his team encompasses a wide range of public health issues, most of which concern the health and well-being of marginalized, underserved, stigmatized, socioeconomically disadvantaged, or otherwise so-called vulnerable populations disproportionately affected by worsening inequalities that are exacerbated in the current context of wars, cost-of-living and energy crises, and various infectious disease outbreaks. While there is no definitive list of groups that can be counted as "vulnerable populations," they include migrants and refugees, sexual and gender minorities (LGBTQIA+ people), older adults, people who are homeless, people with chronic or terminal illnesses, children, and ethnic minorities.