Frederick “Skip” M. Burkle, Jr. MD, MPH, DTM, PhD(Hon.)FAAP, FACEP
Senior Fellow, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Harvard University Visiting Scientist, Harvard School of Public Health Senior International Public Policy Scholar, Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars Senior Associate Faculty, Department of International Health, Johns Hopkins University Adjunct Professor, Division of Military & Emergency Medicine, Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences
Professor Burkle is a Senior Fellow & Scientist with the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Harvard University and the Harvard School of Public Health. He is a Senior International Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars, and former Senior Scholar and now Senior Associate Faculty, Department of International Health with 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 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 and, in 2012 was selected by the National Institutes of Health to receive the Joseph Leiter Lecture Award that recognizes the “best and brightest” in science and medicine. Dr. Burkle has published over 200 scientific articles, 54 book chapters, four books, three on disaster management including Disaster Medicine (1984).
He has worked in and consulted on numerous humanitarian crises 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. 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. A combat decorated and now retired Naval Reserve Captain, he served with the Marines in Viet Nam, Somalia, the Persian Gulf War, and Iraq. He is a current member of the Board of Directors of the International Rescue Committee, the world’s largest refugee organization, the Science Advisory Board of the American Red Cross, and as Chair of the National Disaster Life Support Consortium of the American Medical Association.
