Newsmakers: January 2022
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* Raihana Mehreen

## Feit named executive director

In September, APHA member Monica Feit, PhD, MPH, was named executive director of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine’s Health and Medicine Division. Since 2017, Feit had served as deputy executive director of the National Academies’ Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education.

## Waller joins Census Bureau

APHA member Lance Waller, PhD, was named an advisor of the U.S. Census Bureau’s Census Scientific Advisory Committee in September. Waller is a professor in the Department of Biostatics and Bioinformatics Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University. His research focuses on the advancement of statistical methods for geographic data.

## Benjamin named inclusive leader

In November, GlobalMindED recognized APHA Executive Director Georges Benjamin, MD, with an Inclusive Leader Award in the Health and Wellness category. The award will be presented at the organization’s annual award ceremony in June.

## Cushing appointed chair

Lara Cushing, PhD, MPH, was appointed the Jonathan and Karin Fielding presidential chair in health equity at the University of California-Los Angeles Fielding School of Public Health in October. An assistant professor in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Cushing’s research focuses on issues of environmental justice.

## Bedimo, Kelley receive awards

In October, the HIV Medicine Association Clinical Educator Award was presented to Roger Bedimo, MD, MS, FIDSA. Bedimo is a professor of medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern. The association also presented its Research Award to Colleen Kelley, MD, MPH, a tenured associate professor of medicine at Emory School of Medicine, for her work on HIV and STI transmission.

## Adams named presidential fellow

Jerome Adams, MD, MPH, was named a presidential fellow at Purdue University and the university’s first executive director of health equity initiatives in October. Adams will join the faculty at the university’s health care engineering center. Prior to serving as U.S. surgeon general from 2017 to 2021, Adams was the Indiana’s health commissioner.

## Haddad named chair

In October, Marwan Haddad, MD, MPH, was named chair for the HIV Medicine Association’s Board of Directors. Haddad is medical director of the Center for Key Populations for Community Health Center. The center works to increase access to primary care for vulnerable populations.

## Cooper, Desmond-Hellmann join council

In September, Lisa Cooper, MD, MPH, and Sue Desmond-Hellmann, MD, MPH, were named to the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. Cooper is the Bloomberg distinguished professor of equity in health and health care at Johns Hopkins University. Desmond-Hellmann is former CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and headed the development of the first gene-targeted drug for breast cancer.

## Lavizzo-Mourey receives award

Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, MD, MBA, received the Gustav O. Lienhard Award for Advancement of Health Care in September. Lavizzo-Mourey was recognized for increasing access to health care, addressing childhood obesity and promoting a culture of health in the U.S. She is the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation population health and health equity professor emerita at the University of Pennsylvania.

*   Copyright The Nation’s Health, American Public Health Association