Silvia Pessah

Silvia Ester Pessah Eljay (born 9 August 1967) is a Peruvian surgeon. She served as the country's Minister of Health from 2 April 2018 to 5 January 2019, in the government of Martín Vizcarra.

Biography Silvia Pessah was born on 9 August 1967, the daughter of Alberto Pessah Azar and Julia Eljay Levy, both practising Jews.

She attended the Colegio León Pinelo in Lima before studying medicine at the National University of La Plata, Argentina, where she obtained her professional title in 1992. She graduated from the Master of Public Health program at the Cayetano Heredia University, Peru in 1999, and the Master in Biomedicine and Health Computer Science program at the University of Washington.

Career In 1992, Pessah started working at the National Institute of Neoplastic Diseases, where she was an attending physician until 1995.

She worked at the Israeli Ministry of Health from 2011 to 2013, where she was a researcher and responsible for the implementation of the National Law on Hospital Quality Assurance.

In the academic field, she has served as an associate professor at Cayetano Heredia University.

Selected publications Servicios interculturales para la mujer, de la teoría a la práctica (2005) Action of the bothropic polivalent antivenom against proteolitic proteins of the Peruvian snake ́s venom (2008) Multicentric study. Women's health and domestic violence. Peruvian results (2008), coauthor Rabies situation in Israel in the period 2000–2014 (2015), coauthor Sexual transmitted disease in Israel in the period 2000–2014 (2015), coauthor National guideline of brucellosis in Israel (2016), coauthor