Felicia Knaul

Knaul was appointed director of the Miami Institute for the Advanced Study of the Americas in 2016, where she worked to guide palliative care in Mexico.

In 2009, Knaul joined the faculty at the Harvard Global Equity Initiative, which was chaired by Amartya Sen. She worked to expand access to cancer care around the world, launching the Global Task Force on Expanded Access to Cancer Care. Within months of arriving, she coordinated an international conference on breast cancer care in low and middle income countries.

After her own experiences of breast cancer, Knaul focused on tackling disparities in access to cancer screening in Mexico. She established a non-profit focused on improving women's awareness of the risks associated with breast cancer in 2007. The organisation, Cáncer de Mama: Tómatelo a Pecho's name derives from a Mexican saying (“take it to breast,”), which makes to take it seriously. She was appointed to the Lancet Commission on Women and Health in 2012, and argued that improving the health of girls and women is critical for sustainable development. In 2013, Knaul described her experiences in the book Beauty without the Breast.

Knaul was diagnosed with stage II breast cancer in 2007. She underwent surgery in Mexico City, and, after a full mastectomy, had fifteen months of chemotherapy. She was treated with Trastuzumab and Tamoxifen.

Knaul was born and raised in Toronto. Her father is a Holocaust survivor, whose family had been murdered by the Nazis. She said that "the mute cry of the Holocaust was tattooed on my father's forearm,". In 1984, Knaul's father died from stomach cancer. This experience motivated her to improve people's access to healthcare. Knaul was an undergraduate student in the University of Toronto where she studied international development. During her early career, she worked with street children in Guatemala. She moved to the United States for graduate studies, specialising in economics at Harvard University in the research group of Amartya Sen. Her doctoral research considered the impact of education on young people's earning. She conducted research in Bogotá.

Felicia Marie Knaul (born April 24, 1966) is a British–Canadian health economist who is director of the University of Miami Institute for Advanced Study of the Americas and a professor at the Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine. She is an economist with the Mexican Health Foundation and president of the non-governmental organization Tómatelo a Pecho, an advocacy organisation that promote women's health in Latin America. Her research and leadership has focused around raising awareness of breast cancer in low and middle income countries.