Dr Nick Coatsworth is a Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and specialises in both respiratory medicine and infectious diseases. Dr Coatsworth came to prominence as one of the four deputy chief medical officers for the federal government's Department of Health as it was dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. As of January 2021 the health department website no longer listed him as a deputy chief medical officer, but said he continued to provide advice to the department in the COVID-19 response. Dr Coatsworth currently serves as executive director of medical services for Canberra Health Services.
His prior roles have included director of infectious diseases at Canberra Hospital and executive director at the National Critical Care and Trauma Response Centre in Darwin.
Dr Coatsworth is deeply committed to humanitarian causes. As a doctor with Medecins sans Frontieres, he has worked in Congo-Brazzaville, Chad and in the Darfur region of Sudan. He was elected to the Board of Medecins sans Frontieres in Australia in 2008, serving as president in 2010 and 2011.
In the Northern Territory, Dr Coatsworth is very involved with indigenous health, regularly visiting remote indigenous communities.
He attained his undergraduate degree in Medicine at the University of Western Australia and has a Masters in International Public Health from the University of Sydney.
