Maine News Updates

A top student of the University of New England College of Osteopathic Medicine has been killed in a bus accident in Tanzania, according to a press release issued by the school this morning.

Kathryn Brooke Baxter, 32, who went by the name Brooke, died July 26.

She recently completed her first year as a medical student, said UNE spokeswoman Kathleen Taggersell. Baxter was in Kenya this summer conducting research on prenatal services for expectant mothers co-infected with HIV and malaria. The trip was funding by a UNE Student Government Association Carman Pettapiece Student Research grant.

"A recent resident of Philadelphia, PA., she graduated from New Hope-Solebury Jr/Sr. High School in New Hope, PA.  She attended the Univ. of Florida at Gainesville, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts in Cultural Anthropology and African Studies in 2000," Taggersell said in the press release. "Her undergraduate education included an independent living experience in a rural farming community in northern Tanzania."

"Brooke received her Master in Public Health from Tulane University in 2002, and studied at the World Health Organization Centre for International Health Economics at Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok.
 
"From 2003-2007, Brooke continued post-baccalaureate pre-health studies at the University of Pennsylvania, Villanova University and Temple University.  During this time Brooke was involved with significant research, advocacy, and education initiatives for numerous global health issues, such as HIV/AIDs.  She was committed to raising public awareness and changing lives through her hands-on dedication to important international issues."

"Brooke received the F. Edward Hébert Armed Forces Health Professions Scholarship Program through the U.S. Army and was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the US Army Medical Corp.   She was studying at the UNE College of Osteopathic Medicine on this scholarship, in the Class of 2013." 
 
Baxter is survived by her parents, Ret. U.S. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Harry and Jeanne Baxter, two sisters and two brothers-in-law.