Three faculty members from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health — Wafaie Fawzi, Vikram Patel, and John Quackenbush — have been elected to the National Academy of Medicine. Membership is considered one of the highest honors in the fields of health and medicine and recognizes individuals who have demonstrated outstanding professional achievements and commitment to service.
Fawzi, Richard Saltonstall Professor of Population Sciences and professor of nutrition, epidemiology, and global health, was chosen for making outstanding contributions to advancing the science of safety and efficacy of nutritional interventions in the prevention and management of major global health threats, for spurring translation of evidence into policy and programs, and for leading major efforts to train future public health leaders. Fawzi has focused on interventions to enhance maternal health and child health and development, particularly in developing countries in Africa and Asia.
Patel is professor in the Department of Global Health and Population at Harvard Chan School as well as Pershing Square Professor of Global Health in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He was chosen for his scholarship on the burden and determinants of mental health problems in resource-poor settings, and on the deployment of community resources for their prevention, diagnosis, and care. His efforts were cited for transforming policy and practice globally and for driving the emergence of “global mental health” as a vibrant field of research, training, implementation, and advocacy.
Quackenbush is Henry Pickering Walcott Professor of Computational Biology and Informatics and chair of the Department of Biostatistics at Harvard Chan School, as well as professor in the Channing Division of Network Medicine, and professor at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. He was named to NAM for being a pioneer in computational and systems biology and reproducible research with a record of continuous innovation. His recent work bridges the gap between genetics and gene regulation, giving unprecedented insight into human health and disease, including how a person’s sex influences disease risk and response to therapy.
NAM is one of three academies that make up the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. The National Academies are private, nonprofit institutions that work outside of government to provide objective advice on matters of science, technology, and health.
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