Dr. John Lawrence, a native of Illinois, has previously served as president and vice president of the board. Dr. Lawrence attended Dartmouth College and Dartmouth Medical School, then completed a family practice internship and worked as a general medical officer in Tuba City, Arizona, on the Navajo Reservation. He then returned to residency and completed training in general surgery at the University of Rochester, in Rochester, New York, and pediatric surgery at St. Christopher’s Hospital in Philadelphia. For the past 20 years, he has been a practicing pediatric surgeon, primarily in academic settings, and he is currently a staff pediatric surgeon at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, NY. Owing in part to a longstanding interest in global health, Dr. Lawrence has completed ten surgical missions with Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) since 2009 and is currently working toward an MPH degree through the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Lawrence has served MSF as a surgeon in the Central African Republic, Ivory Coast, Haiti, Syria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Liberia.

Meena Ahamed is a freelance journalist and has contributed articles about American foreign policy to publications, such as “Foreign Policy,” “The Asian Age” and “Seminar” among others. She was the London correspondent for NDTV from 1989-1996. During her professional career she worked at the World Bank and conducted research at Victoria Zenana Hospital. She is based mainly in Washington and New York and holds a post graduate degree (MA) from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Development Economics & Public Health. She is currently associated with the Boards of MSF Holland’s India Trust, Brookings Institution Council, and Turquoise Mountain Foundation USA. Meena Ahamed also serves on the Advisory Board of MSF USA. Her husband, Liaquat Ahamed, is a writer who won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize in history for his book “Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World.”

Dr. Luis Pizarro has led the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi) since September 2022. Dr Pizarro is a medical doctor and global health leader. He also serves as founder and member of the Global Health 2030 think tank, as scientific advisor for Global Health at Sciences Po Paris, and as board member of Sidaction. Having led medical projects for several years in West Africa, he became the first CEO of Solthis, from 2007 to 2019, successfully developing the international health and solidarity organization to become one of the leaders in health in West and Central Africa. In 2020, Dr. Pizarro joined Unitaid’s leadership team during the COVID crisis to lead the international organization’s HIV portfolio and related access programmes. Born in Chile, and trained as a medical doctor at the University of Paris, he also holds a masters’ degree in Political Sciences from Sciences Po and an executive health MBA from a joint programme of EHESP School of Public Health, the London School of Economics, and the ESCP European Management School.

Dr. Shapiro was formerly Executive Vice President, Worldwide Licensing and External Research at Merck Research laboratories. Previously at Merck, he held the position of Executive Vice President, Worldwide Basic Research. Prior to entering the pharmaceutical industry, Dr. Shapiro was Professor and Chairman of the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Washington. He also held the position of Chief, Section on Cellular Differentiation in the Laboratory of Biochemistry at the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) and was a visiting scientist at the Institut Pasteur earlier in his career. Dr. Shapiro presently serves on the boards of several biotechnology companies and non-profit organizations. He received his MD from Jefferson Medical College, Thomas Jefferson University.

Dr. Africa Stewart graduated with honors from Johns Hopkins University in 1995 with a BA in psychology and mathematical science. She then attended Drexel University Medical School in Philadelphia. In 1999 she completed an MBA with a concentration in strategic planning from the University of Pittsburghʼs Katz School of Business. She then returned to Philadelphia to finish her medical training at Drexel. In 2000, Africa received her MD and started her residency in obstetrics and gynecology at Hahnemann University Hospital. Her career with Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) began in Sudan in June 2011. Africa has completed five surgical field assignments with MSF and served as a guide for the organizationʼs Forced From Home exhibition about the global refugee crisis. She was elected to the board of directors in 2017. She continues to support women’s health care locally and abroad with an emphasis on education and prevention.

Dr. Kris Torgeson currently serves as Global CEO of Lifebox, an NGO devoted to safer surgery in low-resource countries. She served as the Secretary General of Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) from October 2008 until September 2012. She started working for MSF in 1998 and was Director of Communications for eight years at MSF USA before joining the MSF International Office. She has worked in numerous emergencies for MSF, and served most recently for MSF in Liberia during the Ebola outbreak. She served as President of the Board of the Alliance for International Medical Action (ALIMA) USA, and is co-founder of Mobilizing Action Toward Climate Change and Health (MATCCH). She earned a BA in East Asian Studies from Wesleyan University, was a Fulbright Research Fellow at Peking University, and earned her Master’s degree in Chinese from Columbia University.