Maria do Carmo Leal is a Professor at the National School of Public Health (NSPH) Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), Brazilian Ministry of Health, and a Senior Researcher of the Brazilian National Council of Research. She is a lead researcher, who has led several investigations into Maternal and Child Health with emphasis in Epidemiology and programme evaluation in her country. Her areas of scientific expertise include Inequalities in Health, Primary Health Care, Reproductive Health, Maternal Mortality and Infant and Child Mortality.

Maria do Carmo Leal coordinates program and project grants funded by the Brazilian National Council of Research, the Brazilian Ministry of Health and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Recently, she has coordinated a major national enquiry, Birth in Brazil: a national survey into Labor and Birth, whose results contributed to supporting the development of an agreement among the Brazilian Ministry of Health, the National Agency of Supplementary Health and private hospitals in order to promote normal labor and birth, as well as the reduction of unnecessary CS. Another product of her work was the Birth in Prisons Study, which showed an overview of antenatal and childbirth care in incarcerated women and was crucial to establishing public policies to ensure sexual and reproductive rights for these women and their children.