Jessica Libove, PhD, IBCLC
Adjunct Faculty
Jessica Libove is a cultural anthropologist and international board certified lactation consultant who serves as the lactation program manager for the City of Philadelphia Department of Public Health. In this role, Jessica brings her clinical and teaching experience to the public health field and focuses on reducing racial disparities in breastfeeding.
Before assuming her role with the PDPH, Jessica was a staff lactation consultant at Lankenau Hospital, where she provided culturally sensitive and evidence-based care to all lactating patients. She also participated as a preceptor in the lactation education of nurse interns, medical students and OB residents.
Before moving to Lankenau, Jessica worked as the breastfeeding program administrator at a WIC program in New Jersey. In this position she managed a staff of breastfeeding peer counselors and an international board certified lactation consultant, and forged partnerships with other health care and child care practitioners in the community.
Jessica has a PhD in cultural anthropology from Rutgers University and over ten years of ethnographic research experience, which gave her the opportunity to work among diverse and often underserved populations both in the United States and abroad. She speaks both French and Spanish fluently.
In addition to breastfeeding, Jessica’s passions include good books; cats; her new puppy; watching gymnastics and dance (since gravity, childbirth and arthritis now impede her own practice); and her two daughters, both of whom breastfed full-term.