Alaa Murabit

Alaa Murabit is a Lybian-Canadian physician based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She is an alternate member of the Board of Directors for Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and Director of Global Policy, Advocacy & Communications at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.^{1) 2)}

She is a medical doctor, global security strategist, women’s rights advocate, and member of the United Nations High-Level Commission on Health Employment and Economic Growth. Murabit is one of 17 Sustainable Development Goal Advocates appointed by the UN Secretary-General and a 2020–2021 Fellow at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute.

Murarbit received an M.D. from the University of Zawia in Libya and an MSc in International Strategy and Diplomacy (with Distinction) from the London School of Economics and Political Science. She completed a medical internship at Zawia Teaching Hospital from September 2013 to September 2014.³⁾

Murabit founded Voice of Libyan Women in 2011, at the age of 21. She has been an Advisor to UN Women's Global Civil Society Advisory Group since October 2014. She was a founding coalition member of the Everywoman, Everywhere initiative at Harvard University, later renamed to the Every Woman Treaty.

In 2016, she became executive director of Phase Minus 1, and later founded Co-Agency, an accelerator for emerging women’s leadership in security, peacebuilding, and policy. She was an International Alert trustee from April 2016 to April 2019.

Murabit is the recipient of more than 100 honors and awards, including the Canadian Meritorious Service Cross, BBC 100 Women, Forbes 30 Under 30, Nelson Mandela Changemaker Award, and Harvard Law School’s Women Inspiring Change. She is an MIT Media Lab Director’s Fellow and an Ashoka Fellow, and she serves on the board of the Malala Fund.

Murabit is an influencer for Deliver for Good, an initiative of Women Deliver.⁴⁾ In 2022, Murabit was selected as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.

She has served as trustee for Malaria No More and Keeping Children Safe, and co-founded the Omnis Institute.⁵⁾

Murabit has received awards and recognitions from the Government of Canada, CNN, the Thomson Reuters Foundation, Aspen Institute, Women of Influence Canada, SheSpeaks, PTTOW, Nelson Mandela Foundation, Forbes, TED Global, Safe Magazine, BBC, Newsweek, Women in the World, the International Herald Tribune Bay Street Bull and Wikipedia.