Laura E. Stachel

Laura E. Stachel, M.D., M.P.H. the co-founder and executive director of WE CARE Solar, is an obstetrician-gynecologist who left clinical medicine to pursue a career in public health. She holds an M.D. from University of California, San Francisco and M.P.H. in Maternal and Child Health from University of California, Berkeley, and is on staff at UC Berkeley. Laura has been studying energy poverty and its effects on rural health care for the last five years. Her research on maternal mortality in Nigeria alerted her to the deleterious effects of energy poverty on maternal health outcomes. Along with her husband, Hal Aronson, she co-founded We Care Solar, a non-profit organization that developed a simple “Solar Suitcase” to bring medical lighting and power to maternal and child health care in regions without reliable electricity.  We Care Solar Suitcases have now been deployed to hundreds of health facilities in over 25 countries. Laura co-chairs a international working group on Energy and Health for the UN Foundation, and has won numerous awards for her work with We Care Solar. This year she is one of the 2013 CNN Heroes.