Cristina Alonso

Director of Public Health

Cristina Alonso is a Doctor of Public Health who has ample experience implementing systems change in complex political settings. Her doctoral dissertation, “The Impact and Social Response to COVID-19 in Chelsea, MA” won the national award for Outstanding Dissertation of 2021 by the DrPH coalition. She was co-founder of the Academic Public Health Corps which deployed over 1000 public health students and professionals to support local public health efforts during COVID. She then became a leader in coordinating Chelsea’s multi/disciplinary COVID response. Prior to working in COVID, Cristina worked for 18 years in Latin America improving the quality of care in maternal health. She founded several full-scope birth centers in Mexico and worked with the Mexican Ministry of Health to integrate midwifery into the health care system. Her book, “Open a midwifery center”, has been published in three languages and is considered the seminal textbook for opening birth centers in low-resource settings. Cristina continues to work in maternal health improvement consulting in Afghanistan and the USA.