Chinese-born doctor Leana Wen, whose family received asylum in US, is new head of Planned Parenthood
Wen has been Baltimore’s health commissioner since 2014, and is the first doctor to head Planned Parenthood in five decades
A Chinese immigrant whose family fled her native country and was granted political asylum in the US when she was aged eight was named Wednesday as Planned Parenthood’s new president, the first doctor to hold the post in five decades.
Dr Leana Wen will assume the role on November 12, six days after US midterm elections in which Planned Parenthood’s political wing plans to spend US$20 million on behalf of candidates who support abortion rights.
Wen, who has been Baltimore’s health commissioner since 2014, will be Planned Parenthood’s sixth president over a century of work providing millions of Americans with birth control, sex education and medical screenings.
When it comes to protecting her patients, she doesn’t back down from a fight
The organisation also is the largest provider of abortions in the US, making it a perennial target for anti-abortion activists. In recent years, its foes have been striving – thus far unsuccessfully – to halt the flow of federal funds that help Planned Parenthood provide some of its non-abortion services.
Wen and her family fled China just before her 8th birthday, were granted political asylum in the US and became US citizens in 2003.
Wen graduated summa cum laude from California State University, Los Angeles, and earned her medical degree from Washington University School of Medicine before becoming a Rhodes Scholar.
Early in her tenure as Baltimore’s health commissioner, she provided strong leadership as the city was wracked by violent protests related to disputed police actions. She expanded trauma and mental health services, and secured funding for a programme designed to treat gun violence as a contagious disease.