Margaret Whitehead is Head of the World Health Organisation collaborating centre for policy research on Social Determinants of Health at University of Liverpool. The range of her work is unparalleled, covering the spectrum from ethics to action, and her seminal paper for WHO is disseminated widely and has been translated into 20 languages. Her empirical studies have elaborated the causes and consequences of social inequalities in health and her policy research includes innovative evidence synthesis methods and exploitation of natural policy experiments to evaluate health inequalities’ impacts of population-wide policies, including the effects of labour market and social welfare policies, health system reforms, and governments’ policy responses to recession.