Lourdes Johanna Avelar Portillo, PhD, MA

Lourdes Johanna Avelar Portillo, PhD, MA, earned her PhD in the Population, Health and Place at the University of Southern California (USC) where she focused on addressing interim-level needs, specifically the drinking water, sanitation, and hygiene (WaSH) service needs of unhoused communities in Los Angeles. Prior to USC, Johanna earned her MA in Geography at Cal State Long Beach (CSULB) where she explored the intersections of gender, emotional geographies, and water insecurity in rural communities of Santo Tomas, El Salvador. Johanna earned her BA in Geography and Environmental Studies from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). These research experiences have shaped Johanna’s research interests: addressing the experiences of WaSH insecurity and health equity through an intersectional lens. Johanna recently completed a fellowship at UC San Diego’s School of Public Health as a GloCal Health scholar, a program sponsored by the NIH-Fogarty International Center. Using mixed methods, Johanna explored the intersection of WaSH insecurity and generalized anxiety disorder experienced by people who inject drugs living in different housing conditions along the Tijuana-San Diego border region.