Veronica O’Keane is a retired psychiatrist and professor of psychiatry (Trinity College Dublin). Research interests centred on the neuroscience of mood disorders, particularly perinatal depression. She has been committed to the Palestinian cause for decades and visited the occupied West Bank in 2019 on a fact-finding tour. Veronica sailed to Gaza in the 2025 Global Sumud Flotilla to raise awareness of the genocide and to attempt to break the siege and deliver medical supplies. She has written over 100 original scientific paper and a book on memory and consciousness, The Rag and Bone Shop (Allen Lane, Penguin, 2021). Veronica is also an advocate for the positive mood effects of sea swimming.