Ms. Leas serves as the Vice President and North America Head, Public Policy for Novartis, representing all business divisions. She is responsible for developing the organization’s policy priorities and positions on key federal and state public policy issues and government health care programs. Ms. Leas and her team assess the impact of potential legislation and regulations on the Novartis U.S. businesses, including innovative medicines, generics and biosimilar pharmaceuticals. She is a member of the Novartis Public Affairs Leadership Team and leads the U.S. Pricing and Access Steering Committee. Since joining Novartis in 2003, Ms. Leas has held a variety of roles focused on Public Affairs strategy and government access, public policy, managed markets strategy and pharma pricing/contracting. Her prior pharmaceutical industry experience included government pricing/contracting, managed care strategy and product director roles with Bristol-Myers Squibb and Johnson & Johnson. Prior to joining the pharmaceutical industry, Ms. Leas worked for 10 years in the health insurance and pharmaceutical benefits management industries in roles including underwriting and actuarial positions with United Healthcare, and pricing, operations, and account management leadership roles with PCS Health Systems, now a part of the CVS/Caremark organization. Ms. Leas is a board member of the National Pharmaceutical Council, an Advisory Board member of the Leonard D. Schaeffer Center for Health Policy & Economics and an Advisory Board member of the Duke Margolis Center for Health Policy Value-based Payment Consortium. She is a graduate of the University of Kansas with a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration.

Source: BioNJ on 09/05/2022