About Us.
Meg Molloy
CAMPAIGN DIRECTOR
Meg Molloy is Campaign Director of the Tobacco 21 Coalition, and principal consultant, Strategies for Prevention. Meg has 40 years of experience in public health and prevention, policy, and nonprofit leadership.
She led business and elected official engagement for Care4Carolina to build the business case and legislative support for Medicaid Expansion. Prior to that, Meg founded and led NC Prevention Partners for 20 years. Prevention Partners established state-wide public policies, and local private policies in all 100 counties that increased access to healthy foods, active environments, tobacco-free environments and quit tobacco systems. Earlier in her career she provided individual chronic disease care as Nutrition Director for Duke Center for Living, and nutritionist at the Orange County Health Department.
Meg holds a Doctorate of Public Health in Health Policy and Administration where she was a Public Health Leadership fellow, and a Masters of Public Health in Nutrition from the Gillings School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She enjoys traveling and hiking, is a Master Gardener Volunteer, and spearheads a local stormwater collaborative to protect local waterways and support native plant corridors.
Peg O’Connell
CHAIR
Peg O’Connell is a long-time public health advocate and is currently the chair of the Tobacco 21 Advisory Committee of the North Carolina Public Health Association. She also served as the chair of Care4Carolina, the coalition that helped to secure a North Carolina solution for closing the health insurance coverage gap through Medicaid Expansion. She is the immediate past chair of the NC Public Health Association Advocacy Committee and the chair-elect of the North Carolina Citizens for Public Health. She also serves as the chair of the Safe Kids North Carolina Steering Committee.
An attorney by profession, she has over 25 years of experience in legislative, public, regulatory and governmental affairs, healthcare, media and grassroots advocacy at the state and federal levels and has been active in North Carolina working to improve the public health by reducing nicotine and tobacco use, obesity and increasing access to health care.