Loose Women star Katie Piper has been made an OBE in the Queen’s New Year Honours list.
The TV personality and activist, who suffered life-changing burns in an acid attack in March 2008, was recognised for services to charity and victims of burns and other disfigurement injuries.
After surviving the attack at the age of 24, the former model gave up her right to anonymity and made a Channel 4 documentary in 2009 called Katie: My Beautiful Face.
She was left partially blind, with severe scarring to her face, chest, neck, arm and hands, after sulphuric acid was thrown in her face.
She founded the Katie Piper Foundation a few months after the documentary aired to support burns victims, and has undergone more than 250 operations over the past decade.
The 38-year-old, who was born in Hampshire, is a best-selling author, having written 10 memoirs and self-help books, with her latest titled A Little Bit Of Faith.
In 2011, she presented a four-part series for Channel 4 called Katie: My Beautiful Friends, drawing on personal experiences to help other people living with disfigurement rebuild their confidence and their lives.
The TV presenter also hosted Channel 4 documentary Bodyshockers, and became a presenter on BBC One’s Songs Of Praise in 2020, having originally appeared as a contributor sharing her experience of finding faith in a Mother’s Day special.
She also starred in an episode of Celebrity Supply Teachers on CBBC, talking about the benefits of practising gratitude, and appeared on BBC One’s Strictly Come Dancing in 2018.
The mother-of-two hosts a podcast, Katie Piper’s Extraordinary People, in which she chats with inspirational people who have turned adversity into positivity, and is also a panellist on ITV’s Loose Women.
Piper has received an honorary doctorate from the Royal College of Surgeons to mark her groundbreaking work with the Katie Piper Foundation.
