Professor Dame Donna Kinnair

Donna Kinnair was born in Hackney, London, in 1961 to a family that had come to the UK in the 1950s as part of the Windrush generation, with nursing already woven into her family history both in Britain and in the Caribbean, where she has a brother who became a doctor and a sister who became a midwife.

Kinnair's own interest in healthcare was sparked by a lengthy childhood hospital stay, and in 1983 she began training at the Princess Alexandra School of Nursing at the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel, beginning a career as a registered nurse and health visitor.

Over the following decades Kinnair held a series of senior healthcare leadership roles, including Strategic Commissioner for Children's Services across Lambeth, Southwark and Lewisham, Clinical Director of Emergency Medicine at Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals Trust, and Director of Commissioning for Southwark, specialising in child protection.

Kinnair served as one of the expert advisers on the Laming Inquiry into the 2001 death of Victoria Climbié, and advised the Prime Minister's Commission on the Future of Nursing and Midwifery in 2010, before joining the Royal College of Nursing as Head of Nursing in 2015.

Kinnair was appointed Chief Executive and General Secretary of the Royal College of Nursing in 2019, leading the organisation through the COVID-19 pandemic before resigning in 2021 following a period of ill health after a cycling accident; she continues serving as a Non-Executive Director for East London NHS Foundation Trust.