Joanne C. Suarez is a committed community health scholar-activist, bioethics thinker, and social change leader advancing racial justice and health equity. She champions community-driven solutions that transform policies, research, and institutions, ensuring they authentically reflect the lived experiences of those most impacted by systemic inequities.
Her work spans community engagement, policy reform, and movement building, where she leverages collective action for ethical and equitable healthcare and public health interventions. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Joanne supported organizing and mobilizing over 400 healthcare workers and advocates to reform Massachusetts’ Crisis Standards of Care (CSC) policy—the guidelines that govern life-and-death medical decisions when resources like ventilators and ICU beds are scarce. Additionally, she co-led GotVax, a vaccination initiative that delivered over 15,000 vaccines to residents in Boston’s hardest-hit neighborhoods, expanding access for historically underserved populations.
At the helm of Prospera Institute, she has led impact across Boston serving more than 150 individuals across East Boston, Jamaica Plain, Roxbury, and Dorchester, through public health ethics programs that stand as models for integrating ethical frameworks into public health practice, driven by community engagement and responsive policy innovation. Beyond her work at Prospera, Joanne has held leadership roles in local government and nonprofit organizations. As Chief of Staff for the City of Boston’s Community Engagement Cabinet, she managed a $4 million budget organization and helped launch city-wide public health and immigrant rights initiatives by partnering with grassroots organizations. In her consultancy work, she advises on strategic planning, project management, and ethical public health research, with her writing and advocacy featured in The Lancet, The Hastings Center Report, BMJ Leader, and The American Journal of Bioethics.
As a distinguished Dean Fellow and Master of Divinity Candidate at Boston University School of Theology—and a licensed preacher in the African Methodist Episcopal Church—she brings both academic rigor and heartfelt spiritual insight to her work. Joanne holds a Master of Bioethics from Harvard Medical School and a Bachelor’s in Counseling Psychology from Johnson & Wales University.
Joanne is a first-generation Dominican-American living with her dog son Bandit in East Boston. When not meeting professional demands she enjoys exploring diverse spiritual practices that sustain her passions for social change.