Ms. Alicia Ely Yamin is the Visiting Professor of Law at Georgetown Law and Program Director for the Health and Human Rights Initiative at the O’Neil Institute for National and Global Health Law. Her career focuses on the intersection of health and human rights, in both the academic world as well as in activism. She is known globally for her scholarship on and advocacy of right-based approaches to health. She contributed to the drafting of several General Comments by the UN treaty bodies, as well as UN Human Rights Council resolutions. She regularly advises the UN bodies related to health and human rights while providing guidance to NGOs on landmark litigation. She has served on WHO Task Forces and is currently a Commissioner on the Lancet Commission on Global Health and Law. Ms. Yamin was awarded the prestigious Joseph H. Flom Fellowship on Global Health and Human Rights from 2007 to 2011.

 

Ms. Yamin has written a book, Power, Suffering and the Struggle for Dignity: Human Rights Frameworks for Health and Why They Matter, which was published by the University of Pennsylvania Press. This work is focused on defining what a human rights based approach to health and development means, and why it matters. Additionally, it provides a foundation for the understanding of how a human rights based approach implies the potential for social transformation.

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