Lise Van Susteren

Van Susteren received her medical degree in 1982 from the University of Paris. She interned at the Hospital St. Anne and the American Hospital of Paris and at Hospital Tokoin in Lomé, Togo.^[1] She completed her residency training in psychiatry at St. Elizabeths Hospital in Washington, D.C. Van Susteren is board certified in general and forensic psychiatry. She has worked as an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University Department of Psychiatry,^[2] and as a consultant to the Central Intelligence Agency.^[1] conducting psychological assessments of world leaders, and at community mental health centers in the metropolitan Washington, D.C., area.

Van Susteren is a volunteer with Physicians for Human Rights.,^[1] evaluating and testifying on behalf of torture victims seeking political asylum in the United States. She has been a volunteer reader for the Metropolitan Washington Ear.,^[1] an organization that records written material for the blind, and as a volunteer provider at homeless shelters, for victims of Hurricane Katrina, and the 2010 Haiti earthquake. In 1984, Van Susteren co-founded The Friends of St. Elizabeths,^[1] a nonprofit organization dedicated to the humane treatment of the mentally ill and the historic preservation of St. Elizabeths Hospital.

In 2006, former Vice President Al Gore trained Van Susteren at The Climate Project^[1] to educate the public about climate change. She was named to the board of directors of The Climate Project^[3] in 2009. Van Susteren speaks frequently to civic, educational, religious, labor, and environmental groups about the impacts of climate change, particularly the health impacts, in the Washington, D.C., area, nationally, and abroad. In 2009, she organized the first conference to focus on the psychological impacts of climate change. She co-authored "The Psychological Effects of Global Warming on the United States: And Why the U.S. Health Care System is Not Adequately Prepared".^[4]

Van Susteren serves on the boards of Earth Day Network,^[5] Physicians for Social Responsibility,^[6] ecoAmerica,^[7] Chesapeake Climate Action Network,^[8] and Climate Mobilization.^[9] She is a past member of the boards of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard University's T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and the National Wildlife Federation.^[10] She also served on the Climate Energy and Environmental Committee of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments in Washington, DC^[11] and the Policy Advisory Board of Gender Rights Maryland.^[12]

Van Susteren was an expert witness on the psychological damages to children in the case of Juliana vs US. She was also an expert witness in Held v. Montana, in which youth plaintiffs asserted that state support of fossil fuels denied their constitutional right to a "clean and healthful environment."^[13]

Van Susteren is a co-founder of Interfaith Moral Action on Climate,^[14] a multi-faith coalition dedicated to organizing people of religion and spirituality to speak out against climate change. She is also a co-founder of the Climate Psychiatry Alliance and the Climate Psychology Alliance,^[15] both of which are dedicated to the education of mental health professionals and the public about the impacts of climate disruption on our mental health and the need for systemic change to address the threat to public health.

Van Susteren ran for the US Senate seat in Maryland held by retiring Senator Paul Sarbanes in the Democratic primary in 2006.^[16]

Van Susteren is the founder and CEO of "Lucky Planet Foods," a company dedicated to providing low-carbon, plant-based, healthy foods for sustainable living.^[17]