David Heymann

Dr David L. Heymann is professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and former head of the Centre on Global Health Security at Chatham House, London (2009-2019). Until March 2017, he was chairman of the board of Public Health England. Previously, he was the assistant director-general for Health Security and Environment, and representative of the director-general for polio eradication at the World Health Organization (WHO). From 1998 to 2003, he was executive director of the WHO Communicable Diseases Cluster, during which he headed the global response to SARS. Before joining WHO, Professor Heymann worked for 13 years as a medical epidemiologist in sub-Saharan Africa on assignment from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) where, as well as supporting ministries of health in research, he participated in the first and second outbreaks of Ebola hemorrhagic fever. Prior to joining CDC, he worked in India for two years in the WHO smallpox eradication programme.

Professor Heymann is an elected fellow of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies (US) and the Academy of Medical Sciences (UK), and has been awarded several public health awards. In 2009, Professor Heymann was appointed an honorary Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) for service to global public health.