Annie Lyerly, MD, MA is Professor of Social Medicine at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. She is also Research Professor in Obstetrics and Gynecology. Her research addresses socially and morally complex issues in women’s health and reproductive medicine, with a focus on how people assign meaning to reproductive events. A central goal of her work is to inform and reframe debates based on the views of those most profoundly affected by them, and to appropriately weight these individuals’ interests in shaping reproductive health care.

Dr. Lyerly has been supported by the National Institutes of Health, the Wellcome Trust, and the Greenwall Foundation, including its Faculty Scholars Program. Her work has appeared in numerous journals, including Science, JAMA, The New England Journal of Medicine, the Hastings Center Report, the Lancet, and The American Journal of Public Health, as well as the New York Times and Scientific American.

She served as Chair of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists Committee on Ethics, and Co-chair of the Program Committee for the American Society of Bioethics and Humanities. She has also served as an advisor for a wide range of national and international organizations, including the World Health Organization, the March of Dimes, the United States Food and Drug Administration, and the U.S. Task Force Specific on Research Specific to Pregnant and Lactating Women, among others.