Author Profile

Frederick M. Burkle, Jr.

Affiliation: Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA; The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, DC, USA

Professor Burkle, MD, MPH, DTM, PhD(Hon.), is a Senior Fellow with the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Harvard University, and Visiting Scientist at the Harvard School of Public Health. He is a Senior International Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars in Washington DC, and Senior Associate Faculty, Department of International Health and the Center for Refugee & Disaster Response, Johns Hopkins University Medical Institutes. He holds Adjunct Professorships at Monash University School of Medicine and James Cook University in Australia and is Adjunct Professor of Surgery, Division of Military and Emergency Medicine, the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, MD. He is the recipient of the prestigious William Crawford Gorgas Medal for "distinguished work in preventive medicine, groundbreaking work in disaster management and humanitarian assistance and the training of an entire generation of U.S. and international personnel. ”In 2007 he was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies of Sciences. In 2012 he was selected by the National Institutes of Health to give the Joseph Leiter Award lecture recognizing the “best and brightest” in science and medicine. Dr. Burkle has published over 200 scientific articles, 53 book chapters, four books, three on disaster management including Disaster Medicine (1984). He has worked in and consulted on numerous humanitarian emergencies and large-scale international disasters in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe. From 2002-03, Dr. Burkle served as Deputy Assistant Administrator for the Bureau of Global Health at the U.S. Agency for International Development and as the Interim Minister of Health in Iraq. A 1961 Saint Michael’s College and 1965 University of Vermont College of Medicine graduate, Dr. Burkle holds post-graduate degrees from Yale, Harvard, Dartmouth, the University of California at Berkeley, University of Geneva, and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. He is qualified in Emergency Medicine, Pediatrics, Pediatric Emergency Medicine, Psychiatry, and holds a Master's Degree in Public Health and Diploma in Tropical Medicine. He is a combat decorated and now retired Naval Reserve Captain, who served with the Marines in Viet Nam, Somalia, the Persian Gulf War, and Iraq. He is a current member of the Board of Directors and Overseer of the International Rescue Committee, the world’s largest refugee organization, the Science Advisory Board of the American Red Cross, and served as Chair of the National Disaster Life Support Consortium of the American Medical Association for 4 years.

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