Dr. Mary Lake Polan
Clinical Professor, Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, Yale University School of Medicine
Dr. Mary Lake Polan is Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences at the Yale University School of Medicine. She has combined rigorous scientific research with a humanistic clinical approach in a career spanning women’s health, clinical medicine, medical education, and governmental organizations. Dr. Polan organized and led the Stanford-based Eritrean Women’s Project, a health initiative in which surgical volunteers repaired obstetric fistula and trained surgeons in Eritrea. Her career has also included service as Professor and Chair Emerita at Stanford, Adjunct Professor at Columbia, and independent director of QuidelOrtho. In 2024, Dr. Polan received the Elizabeth Blackwell Award from the American Medical Women’s Association.
“A woman’s body belongs to her. Not to her family or to a stranger who is selling her for profit. Sex trafficking—selling and imprisoning girls—is wrong and must be stopped, whether in the developing world or at home in the United States. And we all, men and women, need to work to stop sex trafficking.”