Professor Philippa Howden-Chapman studied at the University of Auckland and was awarded a PhD in 1987. She is the sesquicentennial distinguished professor of public health at the University of Otago, Wellington, New Zealand, and is co-director of two major long-standing research groups, He Kāinga Oranga/ Housing and Health Research Programme and the New Zealand Centre for Sustainable Cities, which both received major research grants in 2020. She conducts randomized community housing trials in partnership with local communities, which have had a major influence on housing, urban policy, and health. Her work focuses on reducing inequalities in the determinants of health and wellbeing and she has received several awards, including the Prime Minister's Science Team Prize. She has a strong interest in reducing inequalities in the determinants of health and has published widely in this area, receiving several awards for her work, including the Prime Minister’s Science Team Prize in 2014. She was chair of the WHO Housing and Health Guidelines Development Group and is currently chair of the ISC Committee on Urban Health and Wellbeing: A Systems Approach and a director on the Board of Kāinga Ora-Homes and Communities.