Mona Hanna-Attisha

Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha was born Mona Hanna in Sheffield to a pair of scientists who fled Iraq during Saddam Hussein’s regime. When Mona was still young, her family moved from England to Detroit, Michigan, where there was a thriving immigrant community of Iraqis and Chaldeans—the Christian sect to which the Hannas belonged. A careful student and a passionate environmental activist from a young age, Mona attended the University of Michigan, where she earned a BS in environmental health and a Master of Public Health degree. She then attended medical school at Michigan State University and completed her last two clinical years of school in Flint, where she would later become the director of the pediatric residency program at Hurley Medical Center, a public teaching hospital located in Flint and affiliated with MSU. In 2015, “Dr. Mona,” as her patients call her, leapt to national attention when she became a whistleblower in the Flint water crisis. Mona had conducted research proving that Flint children’s blood-lead levels had spiked after city officials, seeking to cut corners, switched the city’s water source from the Detroit River to the Flint River. Though the state of Michigan initially dismissed and derided Mona’s claims, they soon reversed their position and confirmed Mona’s extraordinary findings. As a public health advocate, Mona has testified before congress about the Flint water crisis and played a major role in securing federal and state funding and social support for Flint residents.