Public health is a broad topic that envelopes a wide range of topics, including epidemiology, environmental health, occupational health and safety, community health, behavioral and mental health, infectious disease, and more. With the aim of promoting and protecting health, public health professionals many times are working behind the scenes involved in work such as leading organizations, inventing innovative products, and advocating for public health policy changes. Many of these influential individuals receive little or no recognition for their important endeavors, leading the charge in preserving human health.
Check out this list of the 30 most influential people in public health. These public health leaders include professional men and women from around the globe, some of which are nonprofit executives, government and nongovernmental organization leaders, politicians, scientists, inventors, entrepreneurs, and more. Some of these individuals are prominent in the field, while others are more unexpected. Read on to learn more about these influential people, and check out our additional sources listed at the end of this article.
Vivek H. Murthy, MD, MBA
19th and 21st U.S. Surgeon General
As “America’s Doctor,” Dr. Murthy has led responses to the Ebola and Zika viruses, the opioid crisis, and the threat of stress and loneliness on the physical and mental well-being of Americans. Dr. Murthy issued the first Surgeon General’s report on alcohol, drugs and health, challenging the status quo to expand access to prevention and treatment of addiction. Dr. Murthy also issued the Surgeon General’s report on e-cigarettes and youth. Prior to his role as U.S. Surgeon General, Dr. Murthy co-founded VISIONS, a HIV/AIDS education organization; TrialNetworks, a company working to improve efficiency and collaboration in clinical trials; and Doctors for America, an organization mobilizing physicians and medical students to increase access to affordable healthcare. Murthy served as a presidential appointee under President Obama on the Presidential Advisory Council on Prevention, Health Promotion, and Integrative and Public Health. Dr. Murthy’s 2020 book titled “Together: The Healing Power of Human Connection in a Sometimes Lonely World” encourages society and ordinary people to reduce loneliness in themselves and others.
Andrew Bastawrous, MD
Ophthalmologist and Founder of Peek Vision
Born in York, England to Egyptian parents, Andrew Bastawrous was discovered to have impaired vision at age 12 after some time of poor academic performance in school. Once he received his first pair of glasses, life took a dramatic turn; at age 15, he had the highest scores in his exams. It was then that he decided to become a doctor, and he specialized in eye surgery. Dr. Bastawrous is a renowned ophthalmologist who is working to combat eye disease and preventable blindness through smartphone technology that he developed while working in challenging rural communities. He co-invented a mobile app and clip-on device known as the Portable Eye Examination Kit (PEEK) to bring the resources of a clinic to developing nations that lack eye doctors. It can diagnose blindness, visual impairment, glaucoma, and indicators of brain tumors and bleeding. PEEK even stores GPS data of patients to improve ease of follow-up in remote areas. Dr. Bastawrous has been transforming global eye care through this device; leveraging existing resources; building local capacities for eye care; and developing tools to improve screening, diagnosis, and treatment.
Arunachalam Muruganantham
Inventor
An entrepreneur from India, Arunachalam Muruganantham is the inventor of a low-cost sanitary pad making machine that can manufacture pads for less than a third of the cost of commercially manufactured pads. His invention makes it possible for small business owners to adopt his model, creating employment and wealth in poverty-stricken communities. He has brought awareness about menstruation in rural communities, where girls are often forced to drop out of school around puberty. Muruganantham plans to expand production of his machines to more than 100 countries. His work has earned him multiple awards, including being listed by Time Magazine in their 2014 list of the “100 Most Influential People in the World.” He also received a National Innovation Foundation award from President Pratibha Patil in 2005, as well as the Padma Shri award in 2016, which is the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India.
Blake Mycoskie
Founder of TOMS Shoes and Philanthropist
Entrepreneur and philanthropist Blake Mycoskie is best known as the founder of Shoes For A Better Tomorrow (TOMS Shoes), which has donated more than 10 million shoes to people in need around the world. Known for the “One for One” campaign, in Toms announced in 2021 that it would be leaving the “One for One” model to instead donate at least one-third of annual profits to grassroots organizations working in the area of promoting mental health, increasing access to opportunity, and ending gun violence. Their most recent impact report states that “Together, we’ve had a positive impact on over 100 million lives, giving shoes, sight, safe water, and impact grants.” Mycoskie’s first book, titled “Start Something That Matters” was written with the hope that it will motivate others to become philanthropists and turn their ideas into reality. Recognized by People Magazine in its “Heroes Among Us” section, Mycoskie was named by USA Today on their “Five Best Communicators in the World” list in 2013, and on Fortune Magazine’s “40 Under 40” list in 2001.
Charles Lyons
President and CEO of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation
Charles Lyons, President and CEO of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation since 2010, is devoted to promoting children’s welfare and helping HIV/AIDS patients and their families. Since taking over the helm, Lyons has launched affiliate partnership organizations in Tanzania, Mozambique, and Cote d’Ivoire, providing leadership for action under global partnerships such as the “Global Plan Towards the Elimination of New HIV Infections Among Children by 2015 and Keeping Their Mothers Alive.” He works tirelessly to eliminate pediatric HIV infection through research, advocacy, prevention, and treatment. A longtime global health advocate, Lyons has a long history of developing global organizations, including his role as director of special initiative in the Global Development Program at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and multiple leadership roles within the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) organization. Lyons helped form the Global Alliance for Vaccine and Immunization (GAVI), has served on the board, and is a member of the Human Rights Watch Health and Human Health Rights Advisory Committee. Aldo, President Obama appointed Lyons as the U.S. Alternate Representative to the UNICEF Executive Board in 2011.
Ernest Madu, MD
Founder of the Heart Institute of the Caribbean (HIC)
Internationally recognized cardiologist and clinical investigator Dr. Ernest Madu is founder of the Heart Institute of the Caribbean, which is located in Kingston, Jamaica. Working tirelessly to provide access to affordable public healthcare in low-resource countries, his research is focused on management and health effects of globalization in at-risk populations. With Madu’s drive to offer superior healthcare in the developing world, HIC recently announced a partnership with AMPC International Health Consultants (a global healthcare management and hospital development company in Amsterdam) to build a heart and multi-specialty hospital in Jamaica that will model the Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Clinic. Madu earned the prestigious title of Fellow of the European Society of Cardiology College. An expert in healthcare innovations and health systems transformations, he has lectured around the globe. His research has been presented worldwide, and it has been published and cited in the leading journals in cardiovascular medicine.
Dr. Francis Collins
Human Genome Project and Former Director of the NIH
Dr. Francis Collins is the only presidentially appointed NIH director to serve more than one administration, serving under Presidents Obama, Trump, and Biden, recently ending his tenure in December 2021. Dr. Collins is best known as a physician in genetics, completing the Human Genome Project in 2003 with a complete mapping of all 20,500 genes. This project culminated with the completion of the human DNA instruction book. Dr. Collins was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2007, the nation’s highest civil award. He was also awarded the National Medal of Science in 2009 and was the 50th winner of the Templeton Prize in 2020. Dr. Collins is an elected member of both the National Academy of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences and in 2020 was elected as a Foreign Member of the Royal Society (UK).
Georges Benjamin, MD
Executive Director of the American Public Health Association (APHA)
Georges Benjamin is well known as one of the most influential public health leaders, speaking eloquently and passionately about the issues impacting our nation’s health. Serving as the Executive Director of APHA since 2002, his mission is to make the next generation the healthiest in the world. With more than 100 journal articles and book chapters to his name, Dr. Benjamin serves as publisher of APHA’s non-profit magazine, The Nation’s Health, as well as the American Journal of Public Health. A member of the National Academy of Medicine (Formally the Institute of Medicine), and of the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, Dr. Benjamin also serves on the boards for a number of organizations, including Research!America and the Reagan-Udall Foundation. He was named one of the top 25 minority executives in healthcare by Modern Healthcare Magazine in 2008, 2014, and 2016, and he was voted one of the 100 most influential people in healthcare from 2007-2017. His recent book The Quest for Health Reform: A Satirical History is an exposé of the quest to ensure quality affordable healthcare through the use of political cartoons.
Gregory Petsko
Biochemist and Professor
Gregory Petsko is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. His research focuses on protein structures, the way we look at proteins, and what they do. Petsko is also deeply concerned with public health issues and the continuing population shift toward an aging society. Dr. Petsko has targeted closures of university departments, a trend that negatively impacts people worldwide. He has given many public lectures, including a TED talk with more than a million views about aging populations and their effects on public health. He is currently a professor of neurology at the Ann Romney Center for Neurologic Diseases at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, adjunct professor of biomedical engineering at Cornell University, and professor emeritus at Brandeis University. Petsko’s research interests include understanding the biochemical bases and treatment of neurological diseases like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and ALS. He is a key contributor to the fields of protein crystallography, biochemistry, biophysics, enzymology, and neuroscience.
Jeremy Farrar
Professor and Director of the Wellcome Trust
Jeremy Farrar’s entire career has been dedicated to promoting, protecting, and improving global health through the specialty of infectious disease. He is professor of tropical medical medicine and global health at Oxford University, as well as being director of the Wellcome Trust, one of the largest research charities in the world. Committed to the promotion of public health advances in both humans and animals, he is one of the most well-regarded scientists in infectious disease. He is a contributor to the understanding, prevention, and treatment of infectious diseases and viruses including typhoid, tuberculosis, malaria, dengue, and influenza. Prior to directing the Wellcome Trust, Farrar directed the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Vietnam studying tropical medicine and infectious disease. Jeremy played an important part in the Covid-19 pandemic response as a member of the UK government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), the UK Vaccine Taskforce, and the Principles Group of the ACT-Accelerator. In addition to sharing his expertise, he champions rapid investment in Covid-19 testing, treatment, and vaccines to benefit all of humanity. In 2015, he was named 12th in the Fortune list of the World’s 50 greatest leaders, and he was awarded the Memorial Medal and Ho Chi Minh City Medal from the Government of Vietnam for services to public health, medicine, and research, among many other honors.
Lucien Engelen
Founder and CEO of Transform.Health, Founder and former CEO of REshape Innovation Center, Edge Fellow Center for the Edge Deloitte, and an official LinkedIn influencer
Lucien Engelen is founder and currently the CEO of Transform.Health. A frequent keynote speaker at global health events on the future of health, Lucien is a prominent global health strategist. As a health innovator, Engelen promotes patient participation, where patients play a prominent role in their own diagnosis and treatment in what he calls “participatory healthcare.” Engelen invites patients to share their personal healthcare experience at his conferences and only attends conferences that involve patients in some way.
This public health leader leads the Global Digital Health department for Deloitte’s Center for the Edge and was the founding director of the REshape Center at Radboud University Medical Center in The Netherlands. He is one of the initial and official LinkedIn influencers, with over 825K followers. Engelen advocates using technology and social media as a tool for dealing with problems in the medical community, including things such as personnel shortages, budgetary issues, and increased numbers of patients. He organized the TedXMaastricht event called “The Future of Health,” as well as a smart device app that shows AED locations in Holland, and he is on the faculty at Singularity University in California.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus
WHO Director General
Public health leader Tedros Ghebreyesus has been the Director General of the World Health Organization since 2017. He is a biologist, health researcher, and former Ethiopian Minister of Health. During his tenure as Minister of Health, Tedros made progress in improving public health in that country, including initiatives in maternal and child health, HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, and family planning. Tedros is the African who has held the position of WHO Director General, and he is a very visible public health leader. He has played an important role in the response to the Ebola outbreak, and more recently the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2020, Tedros was included in Time’s 100 Most Influential People.
Maureen Bisognano, MS
President Emerita and Senior Fellow, Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI)
Public health leader Maureen Bisognana has worked for the improvement of public health for over 40 years. After her brother died from rapidly progressing Hodgkins disease, Bisognano dedicated her life to improving the lives of patients. Beginning her career as a staff nurse at Quincy Hospital in Massachusetts, she has become a leading authority on improving healthcare systems. She is President Emerita and Senior Fellow, Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), which has operated for 30 years to use improvement science to advance and sustain better outcomes in health and health care across the world. She advises healthcare leaders around the globe and is a frequent speaker at major healthcare conferences focusing on quality improvements. A tireless advocate for change in healthcare, she is also an instructor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, a research associate in the Brigham and Women’s Hospital Division of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities. She is a prominent authority on improving healthcare systems, whose expertise has been recognized by her elected membership to the National Academy of Medicine (IOM), among other distinctions. Bisognano advises health care leaders around the world, is a frequent speaker at major healthcare conferences on quality improvement, and is a tireless advocate for change. Additionally, she chairs the Advisory Board of the Well Being Trust, co-chairs the Massachusetts Coalition for Serious Illness Care with Dr. Atul Gawande, and serves on the boards of the Commonwealth Fund, Indiana University Health, and Nursing Now.
Dr. Atul Gawande
Surgeon, Author, Public Health Leader
Dr. Atul Gawande is a renowned surgeon, author, and public health leader. He practiced general and endocrine surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and was a professor at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health prior to joining the Biden administration. Dr. Gawande became Assistant Administrator for Global Health at USAID in January 2022. He is the founder and chair of Ariadne Labs, which is a joint center for innovation in health systems. He is the founder and chair of Lifebox, a non-profit working toward making surgery safer around the globe. Dr. Gawande co-founded CIC Health, a public benefit corporation that supports pandemic response operations in the U.S., and he served on the transition COVID-19 Advisory Board under President Biden. As an author, he has four best selling books: Complications, Better, The Checklist Manifesto, and Being Mortal. A member of the National Academy of Medicine, Dr. Gawande has won two national Magazine Awards, AcademyHealth’s Impact Award for highest research impact in healthcare, the MacArthur Fellowship, and the Lewis Thomas Award for science writing.
Peter Sands
Executive Director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria
After a distinguished career in banking, most notably as CEO of Standard Chartered PLC, Peter Sands became Executive Director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria in March 2018. While at Standard Chartered, their focus under his direction was on corporate responsibility initiatives on important health concerns, including avoidable blindness, AIDS, and malaria. He served on the board of the Global Business Coalition on AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and was lead non-executive director on the board of the United Kingdom’s Department of Health during this time. He also served on the board of the United Kingdom’s Department of Health. Mr. Sands is affiliated with Harvard as a research fellow, and he is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Science’s Forum on Microbial Threats.
Phil Wilson
Founder of Black AIDS Institute
Phil Wilson is a prominent HIV/AIDS activist, founder, longtime president, and CEO of the Black AIDS Institute. With the goal of ending the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the African-American community by confronting HIV issues from a uniquely Black perspective, the organization’s motto is “Our People, Our Problem, Our Solution.” The organization was founded in 1999, and Wilson stepped down as CEO in 2018 after nearly 20 years of service, to better allow the organization to plan for the future. In addition, Phil was appointed to President Obama’s Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS, served as a World AIDS Summit delegate, and advocated to the CDC for funding for African-American groups to educate and engage the black community regarding HIV/AIDS issues.
Dr. Mirta Roses Periago
Public health leader
Dr. Mirta Roses Periago is an internationally known Argentinian physician and epidemiologist with over 40 years of success in promoting public health, international technical cooperation, and the development of health programs. Former Assistant Director, Director Programme Management (DPM), WHO (1995-2003), Dr Periago served two terms as the Director of the Pan-American Health Organization, PAHO, and regional office for WHO in the Americas 2003-2013. Dr Periago is known for her skills in managing multicultural teams and collaborative and advocacy networks, as well as for using arts, social media, and communications for advancing public health. Dr. Periago has won honorary professorships and doctorates from universities throughout the Americas for her work. Dr. Periago currently is actively retired in Argentina and sits on a number of Boards, including the Global Fund, Fundación Mundo Sano, and Gulbenkian Global Mental Health Platform. She is also a member of a number of Advisory Boards and Experts Group.
Dr. Peter Attia
Longevity physician
Dr. Attia is a trained surgeon focusing on the applied science of longevity. His medical practice deals with nutritional interventions, exercise physiology, sleep physiology, emotional and mental health, and pharmacology with the goal of increasing the lifespan and delaying the onset of chronic diseases while improving quality of life. Dr. Attia was a co-founder with science journalist Gary Taubes of the Nutrition Science Initiative (now dissolved as of 12/2021), which was a non-profit that funded four projects on the relationship between nutrition, obesity, and metabolic diseases. All four of these studies resulted in publication in prestigious journals and received media attention, with three of these papers designated as “highly cited papers “ by the Clarivate Web of Science. Dr. Attia’s website, podcast, and weekly email newsletter all focus on translating the science of longevity into something accessible and actionable for everyone.
Rebecca Onie
Co-Founder and C.E.O. of Health Leads
Public health leader Rebecca Onie is the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Health Leads, previously known as Project HEALTH. While an intern at Boston Medical Center during her undergraduate years, Onie saw that people living in poverty often get repeatedly sick due to substandard living conditions. Health Leads was created in 1996 to address this and other underlying socioeconomic issues that affect public health. Health Leads is made up of student volunteer groups in cities across the country, which help patients fill doctors’ “prescriptions” for treatments like nutritious food, increased exercise, employment assistance, and things like helping to restart the heat in their homes, rather than traditional pharmaceuticals. Onie is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and an Aspen Institute Health Innovators Fellow. Rebecca Onie has earned recognition for her innovation as a public health leader from publications including Forbes and O! Magazine, and she received a MacArthur Genius Fellowship in 2009. In addition, she has received the APHA Avedis Donabedian Quality Award, Network for Excellence in Health Innovation “Innovator in Health” Award, Robert Wood Johnson Young Leader Award, and Forbes’ Impact 30 Award for leading social entrepreneurs. Oni earned her J.D. from Harvard Law School, where she was an editor for Harvard Law Review.
Dr. Seyi Oyesola
Inventor of CompactOR
Nigerian-born Dr. Seyi Oyesola was raised in the United States. Disturbed by shortages in important hospital supplies and power outages and their effect on health outcomes in his home country of Nigeria, Dr. Oyesola co-invented CompactOR, a mobile mini hospital run off-grid with solar energy. The CompactOR contains all the basics for emergency healthcare and can be airlifted or taken by jeep into remote areas, bringing the capability for surgical care to all parts of Africa and other remote areas. The CompactOR can be set up in 10 minutes with all relevant surgical tools, including defibrillators, EKG monitoring, anesthesia, and surgical lighting, making surgeries like wisdom tooth removal, cataract surgery, and removal of gall bladders and appendices possible. Seyi Oyesola calls for more flexible healthcare solutions that can be used to treat patients without needing an established medical infrastructure to function.
Thulasiraj Ravilla
Director-Operations for Aravind Eye Care System. Founder and Executive Director of Lions Aravind Institute of Community Ophthalmology (LAICO)
Public health leader Thulasiraj Ravilla is the Director-Operations of the largest eye care facility in the world, the Aravind Eye Care System. In addition, he is the Executive Director of Lions Aravind Institute of Community Ophthalmology (LAICO), which helps other eye care practices build capacity. Ravilla works to bring eye care to underserved areas in India and around the globe, knowing that even basic care can make an immense difference in the life of a patient. By providing 55% of its services at subsidized or no cost, the Aravind Eye Care System makes their services widely available to those who need it. Ravilla has won distinctions for his important work as a public health leader, including the Hilton Humanitarian Award and the Bill & Melinda Gates Award for Global Health, and 2014’s Most Inspiring Healthcare Leader of the Year by Times of India, among other awards.
Vikram Patel, Ph.D.
Psychiatrist, researcher, and mental healthcare advocate
Vikram Patel is an Indian psychiatrist, researcher, and Professor at Harvard Medical School, best known for his work on child development and mental disability in low-resource settings. He helped create and direct the Center for Global Mental Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, whose mission is to close the “treatment gap” between the number of people worldwide with mental illnesses and the number of those people actually receiving treatment. Patel also co-founded and chaired Sangath, an organization dedicated to research in the areas of child development, adolescent health, and mental health. Dr. Patel served as an editor of the Lancet Series on Global Mental Health. A member of several Indian government committees on public health and mental health, he also serves on three WHO (World Health Organization) committees, and he was awarded a Wellcome Trust Principal Research Fellowship in 2015. Dr. Patel wrote “Where There is No Psychiatrist,” a mental health manual for non-mental health specialists. For his contributions to the mental healthcare community, Vikram Patel has also won the Rhodes Scholarship, the MacArthur Foundation Fellowship for Leadership Development, and many other honors, including being listed as one of the world’s 100 most influential people by TIME Magazine in 2015.
Rochelle P. Walensky, MD, MPH
Director Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Administrator of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry
Dr. Rochelle P. Walensky is an influential scholar whose important, pioneering research helped advance the global response to HIV/AIDS. Also a well-respected authority on the testing and treatment of deadly viruses, Dr. Walensky served as Chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Massachusetts General Hospital from 2017-2020 and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School from 2012-2020. Dr. Walensky was on the front line of the COVID-19 pandemic and conducted research on vaccine distribution and strategies to reach communities in underserved areas. Recognized as an international expert for her work to improve HIV screening and care in South Africa, she is nationally recognized for motivating health policy and informing clinical trial design and evaluation in different settings. Dr. Walensky has served as a Chair of the Office of AIDS Research Advisory Council at the National Institutes of Health, Chair-elect of the HIV Medical Association, and as an advisor to the World Health Organization and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS.
Dr. Roopa Dhatt
Co-founder and Executive Director Women in Global Health
Dr. Roopa Dhatt is a practicing physician who is committed to fight gender inequalities in healthcare leadership. Founded in 2015 with the goal of achieving gender equality in global health leadership, Women in Global Health has grown to more than 25,000 global supporters and chapters around the world, including in Germany, USA, Norway, East Africa, Pakistan, and Australia. Dr. Dhatt also teaches as an Assistant Professor and Internal Medicine Hospitalist at Georgetown University Medical Center, and she practices at a community hospital in Washington, D.C. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Dhatt highlighted the gender aspects of COVID-19, including that there was a disproportionate number of frontline workers who were women, yet were not part of leadership roles that affected workers. She was part of a team that worked to evaluate language used by men and women leaders during the pandemic. On International Women’s Day 2021, alongside World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom, Dr. Dhatt signed a memorandum of understanding regarding women’s position in global health. Dr Dhatt was recognized in the Gender Equality Top 100 most influential people in global policy 2019. Born in India and emigrated to the United States at the age of five, Dr. Dhatt recalls her exposure to health inequities during a trip to India when she was nine years old, leading her to pursue a career in medicine.
Professor Trisha Greenhalgh
Co-Director of the Interdisciplinary Research In Health Sciences (IRIHS) unit of Oxford University
Dr. Trisha Greenhalgh is a general practitioner and internationally known academic in primary healthcare. As the co-Director of the Interdisciplinary Research In Health Sciences (IRIHS) unit of Oxford University, she leads research in the interface between social sciences and medicine. She is an award-winning researcher and was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for her services to Medicine by Her Majesty the Queen in 2001 in evidence-based care. Dr. Greenhalgh is an influential public health leader in public health policy and is outspoken on issues concerning equality and transparency. She has held professorships at University College London and Queen Mary University of London. Dr. Greenhalgh was made a Fellow of the UK Academy of Medical Sciences in 2014, and she was later elected an International Fellow of the US Academy of Medicine in 2021. She is a Fellow of the UK Royal College of Physicians, Royal College of General Practitioners, Faculty of Clinical Informatics, and Faculty of Public Health.
Nimco Ali, OBE
Founder and CEO The Five Foundation
Nimco Ali, a British social activist originally from Somalia, is a tireless public health leader who campaigns against female genital mutilation (FGM) and violence against women and girls. The Five Foundation works to prioritise the urgent and underfunded public health issue of female genital mutilation (FGM), a tragic abuse that has affected over 200 million women and girls globally. It is estimated that 70 million more girls will be forced to undergo FGM by 2030 if there is no effective intervention to prevent this from continuing. Nimco was awarded an OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) during the 2019 Queen’s Birthday Honours for her work. She was also appointed as adviser to the British Government on the Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy, published in 2021.
Dr. Anthony Fauci
Director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)
Dr. Fauci came to public health fame while leading the COVID-19 response in the United States. America’s top infectious disease expert, he was appointed Director of NIAD in 1984. Dr. Fauci has advised seven Presidents on many domestic and global health issues. Dr. Fauci oversees an extensive research portfolio aimed at preventing, diagnosing, and treating infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS, diarrheal diseases, respiratory infections, tuberculosis, malaria, and emerging diseases like Ebola and Zika virus. NIAID supports research on transplantation and immune-related illnesses, autoimmune disorders, asthma, and allergies. Public health leader Fauci was a principal architect of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which was an effective program that has saved many lives throughout developing countries around the world.
Dr. Scott Gottlieb
Physician, policy expert, public health leader
Dr. Gottlieb, a former Commissioner of the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA), is a member of the National Academy of Medicine, and he is a news outlet contributor. He serves on the Board of Directors of Illumina, Inc., a company that develops and manufactures systems for analyzing genetics. Gottlieb is a Board Director at Aetion, Inc., a healthcare data technology company, and he is Scientific Advisor for Tempus, a technology company making innovative tools for personalized patient care. Dr. Gottlieb is on the Executive Committee of Pfizer, which produced one of the first coronavirus vaccines during the COVID-19 pandemic, and he has been a proponent of reliable and science-based public health information throughout the pandemic. Dr. Gottlieb’s book examining shortcomings of the U.S. COVID-19 response is examined in his book titled “Uncontrolled Spread: Why COVID-19 Crushed Us and How We Can Defeat the Next Pandemic.”
Dr. Ashley Bloomfield
Chief Executive New Zealand Ministry of Health & Director General of Health
Dr. Ashley Bloomfield led New Zealand’s response to COVID-19, which included expeditious testing, contact tracing and isolation, and rigorous public health guidelines. New Zealand’s response resulted in only 52 deaths due to COVID-19, a very small percentage of those who contracted the virus. Prior to 2018, when he was appointed to these top positions in New Zealand, Bloomfield worked for a number of health organizations, including a stint with the World Health Organization where he worked on non-communicable disease prevention and control. Dr. Bloomfield is also a rugby enthusiast and enjoys playing in rugby matches. In November, he was named one of the best-dressed men on David Hartnell’s best-dressed list.
Dr. Sanjay Guptar
Neurosurgeon, medical reporter, and author
Public health leader Dr. Sanjay Gupta is associate chief of neurosurgery at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, and he is an associate professor of neurosurgery at Emory University Hospital. Dr. Gupta serves as a diplomate of the American Board of Neurosurgery. He is well known as chief medical correspondent at CNN. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is the winner of multiple Emmy awards through his work as a medical correspondent. His CNN podcast “Chasing Life,” has been selected to receive the 2022 William Allen White Foundation National Citation, an award recognizing individuals for outstanding service in journalism. Dr. Gupta was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2019, one of the highest honors in the field of medicine. He is a writer, with popular books including “Keep Sharp: Build a Better Brain at Any Age,” “World War C: Lessons from the Covid-19 Pandemic and How to Prepare for the Next One,” and “Chasing Life: New Discoveries in the Search for Immortality to Help You Age Less Today,”
By Carol Dolan BS RN BSN CDCES
January 2022
Carol graduated with her BS in Nutrition from Montclair State University and her BSN in Nursing from Rowan University. She is a Certified Diabetes Care and Education Specialist (CDCES) currently working with adults and children living with diabetes in both outpatient and inpatient settings.
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