Melanie Walker, MD, is Deputy Director for Special Initiatives at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, where she leads a team exploring emerging issues across health and development, including urban development. She joined the foundation from the World Health Organization, where she worked in a number of different roles, most recently as part of the Commission for Macroeconomics and Health. She has extensive experience as a practitioner in the developing world, and maintains a clinical practice at the University of Washington School Of Medicine. In 2011, the World Economic Forum recognized her as a Young Global Leader even though she doesn’t feel very young anymore.