HealthRight International Appoints Mila Rosenthal as Executive Director
July 23, 2009 — The Board of Directors of HealthRight International, Inc. (formerly Doctors of the World-USA) is pleased to announce the appointment of Mila Rosenthal as the organization’s next Executive Director.
"Mila’s passion and commitment to improving the lives of others, her wide-ranging field experience working with poor and marginalized communities in the developing world and here in the US, her keen intellect and her strong leadership make her a wonderful choice to lead HealthRight," said Arthur Fried, co-chair of the search committee.
Rosenthal succeeds Tom Dougherty on September 8, 2009 as Dougherty completes his term of nearly seven years. "We were sorry about Tom’s decision to seek new challenges, but extremely pleased with the great strides we made under his tenure," said Steven J. Berger, chairman of the Board and co-chair of the search committee. "Thanks to Tom and his team, HealthRight has grown in size and impact, with an impressive record of success doing critical work building lasting access to health for excluded communities around the world. We are confident that Mila will help us continue and expand on this success."
"I am thrilled and excited to join HealthRight and its dedicated staff and volunteers," said Rosenthal. "The right to health is among the most basic and essential human rights. There has never been a greater need for HealthRight’s work to provide local communities with the means to fight disease, to prevent women from dying in childbirth, and to ensure torture survivors have refuge and children have the support and protection of families."
Rosenthal brings 17 years of experience in international affairs and development to HealthRight. She is currently a Deputy Executive Director of Amnesty International USA (AIUSA), responsible for research and policy. She has directed AIUSA’s advocacy addressing global human rights challenges, including overseeing an upcoming research report on maternal mortality in the US and discrimination in access to health care. In her leadership role at AIUSA, Rosenthal managed substantial organizational change and worked to implement a transformative strategic plan.
Rosenthal has a long track record working on poverty alleviation, labor rights, child welfare and post-war reconstruction. She has worked with many international organizations in both headquarters and field offices and worked closely with local organizations and community groups across Asia, including in Cambodia, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and Bangladesh. Rosenthal spent three years in Vietnam conducting field research on the social impacts of globalization on women for her Ph.D. from the London School of Economics.
HealthRight International (formerly Doctors of the World-USA) is a global health and human rights organization working to build lasting access to health for excluded communities. Since its founding in 1990 by the late Dr. Jonathan Mann, HealthRight has worked in over 30 countries, with current projects in Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, Latin America, and the United States. For more information, please visit: www.healthright.org.
