Eunice Brookman-Amssiah is a

Ghana Ghana, officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It is situated along the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, and shares borders with Côte d’Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, and Togo to t ...

ian former

Minister of Health A health minister is the member of a country's government typically responsible for protecting and promoting public health and providing welfare spending and other social security services. Some governments have separate ministers for mental heal ...

and also served as an

Ambassador An ambassador is an official envoy, especially a high-ranking diplomat who represents a state and is usually accredited to another sovereign state or to an international organization as the resident representative of their own government or so ...

to the

Kingdom of the Netherlands The Kingdom of the Netherlands (, ;, , ), commonly known simply as the Netherlands, is a sovereign state consisting of a collection of constituent territories united under the monarch of the Netherlands, who functions as head of state. The re ...

under the

Rawlings government This is a listing of the ministers who served in Jerry Rawlings's National Democratic Congress government during the Fourth Republic of Ghana. This started on January 7, 1993, after 11 years of military rule by Rawlings. He retired from the Ghana ...

. She was the first female vice-president of the

Ghana Medical Association The Ghana Medical Association (GMA) represents physicians, surgeons and dentists working throughout Ghana. It was established in 1958 and is divided into ten divisions representing each region of Ghana as at the end of 2018. History The earliest ...

. Brookman-Amissah is also a physician whose leadership has been instrumental in advancing safe abortion access across

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

. Her efforts have successfully united healthcare providers, government officials, lawyers and activists in support of abortion law reforms in several African countries including

Mozambique Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique, is a country located in Southeast Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west, and Eswatini and South Afr ...

Sierra Leone Sierra Leone, officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered to the southeast by Liberia and by Guinea to the north. Sierra Leone's land area is . It has a tropical climate and envi ...

Benin Benin, officially the Republic of Benin, is a country in West Africa. It was formerly known as Dahomey. It is bordered by Togo to the west, Nigeria to the east, Burkina Faso to the north-west, and Niger to the north-east. The majority of its po ...

Eswatini Eswatini, formally the Kingdom of Eswatini, also known by its former official names Swaziland and the Kingdom of Swaziland, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. It is bordered by South Africa on all sides except the northeast, where i ...

and

Kenya Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya is the 27th-most-populous country in the world and the 7th most populous in Africa. ...

. In 2023, Brookman-Amssiah was named as one of three

Right Livelihood Award The Right Livelihood Award is an international award to "honour and support those offering practical and exemplary answers to the most urgent challenges facing us today." The prize was established in 1980 by German-Swedish philanthropist Jakob vo ...

laureates for her work on liberalising abortion laws and promoting access to safe abortions in Africa.

References

Living people Women government ministers of Ghana Year of birth missing (living people) 20th-century Ghanaian politicians 20th-century Ghanaian women politicians 20th-century diplomats Ghanaian women ambassadors Ambassadors of Ghana to the Netherlands National Democratic Congress (Ghana) politicians Members of the Council of State (Ghana) {{Ghana-politician-stub