Dr. Louisa Baxter

Louisa Baxter is a medical and public health doctor with over fifteen years of experience providing health care to marginalised communities within the UK and globally. Dr. Baxter is currently the Head of the Medical Unit at Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders) Spain. She leads teams providing health and social care internationally to populations experiencing humanitarian crises. Dr. Baxter's focus is on the intersection between health equity and social justice in low-resource domestic and international humanitarian settings. Also, she highlights the particular health needs of women and children, who are marginalised within current public health and social care programming. Her work has included supporting COVID response programs in the UK for women and children seeking asylum and establishing programs to tackle sex and gender-based violence for women on the move in refugee camps in Europe and the Middle East. Dr. Baxter has previously worked in the NHS, the UK Health Security Agency, the UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office, and a variety of international agencies including Save the Children, the United Nations High Commission on Refugees, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She is currently the Vice Chair of a UK charity providing front-line health and social care services to female sex workers. She is also a trustee of a UK charity providing legal aid services for refugees and migrants. Dr. Baxter brings to Shelter an understanding of the complex relationships between housing and health and a commitment to social and environmental justice. (Date appointed: 1 October 2023)