Director of National Immunization Program at CDC Joins Emory University School of Medicine

Emory University
Thursday, 8 January 2004

Walter A. Orenstein, MD, director of the National Immunization Program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), will join the Emory University School of Medicine in March 2004 as Director of a new Emory Program for Vaccine Policy and Development and as Associate Director of the Emory Vaccine Center. Dr. Orenstein will retire from his 26-year career in the CDC's immunization program, where he has led the global effort to eliminate many of the world's most common vaccine-preventable diseases. In his new position he also will serve as Associate Director of the Southeastern Center for Emerging Biologic Threats, a regional partnership led by Emory University.

Dr. Orenstein's primary appointment will be in the Division of Infectious Diseases in the Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics in Emory University School of Medicine. He also will hold faculty appointments in the Departments of International Health and Epidemiology in Emory's Rollins School of Public Health. He is expected to help assemble a nationally recognized scientific program and foundation in clinical vaccine development and policy, building on Emory's well-established and highly respected programs in vaccine development and infectious diseases research and treatment.

"Dr. Orenstein has played a key role in a number of the most important public health efforts of our time," said Thomas J. Lawley, MD, dean of Emory University School of Medicine. "We are most fortunate that he will join our Emory faculty and an outstanding group of scientists and physicians in infectious diseases and vaccines. The recent pace of Emory's growth in infectious diseases and vaccine research has been outstanding, and I expect Dr. Orenstein to be a catalyst for continued innovation and an era of groundbreaking leadership by Emory in vaccine science and policy."

"Scientists in our Emory Vaccine Center have been responsible for groundbreaking discoveries that promise to have a major impact on some of the world's most challenging infectious diseases," said Rafi Ahmed, PhD, director of the Emory Vaccine Center and Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar. "Dr. Orenstein's global public health experience and numerous successes in furthering vaccine development and shaping effective vaccine policy will help ensure that the results of our Emory vaccine research are able to benefit the greatest number of individuals worldwide."

"The excitement about the future of vaccine research at Emory is tremendous," said David Stephens, MD, director of the Division of Infectious Disease in Emory University School of Medicine and Executive Director of the Southeastern Center for Emerging Biologic Threats. "Dr. Orenstein will help us build on the research synergies among our Emory Vaccine Center, the Yerkes National Primate Research Center, the Rollins School of Public Health, the Southeastern Center for Emerging Biologic Threats, the Emory Center for Human Immunology, and the Departments of Medicine, Pediatrics, Pathology, and Microbiology and Immunology in the Emory School of Medicine."

During Dr. Orenstein's tenure at the National Immunization Program, he has led successful efforts to combat and markedly reduce the occurrence of once common childhood diseases, including meningitis from Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib), rubella, varicella, and invasive pneumococcal disease. The Immunization Program also has made major contributions: protecting adults from vaccine-preventable diseases through eliminating barriers to vaccination and developing new vaccine strategies, expanding vaccine safety efforts, improving risk communication, and promoting the use of immunization registries. Dr. Orenstein's CDC staff, working with global public health organizations and partners, reduced the number of polio cases worldwide from about 350,000 in 1988 to fewer than 700 in 2003. The number of countries with endemic polio was reduced from 125 in 1988 to only 6 at the end of 2003.

Dr. Orenstein received his bachelor's degree at The City College of New York, and his medical degree at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in 1972. He completed an internship and a residency in pediatrics at the University of California, San Francisco, followed by a fellowship in infectious diseases at the University of Southern California Medical School and a residency in preventive medicine at the CDC.

He has served in leadership roles within the CDC's immunization program since 1982, and since 1993 has been Director of the National Immunization Program. He has served as a consultant to the World Health Organization and to the Pan American Health Association for programs in polio eradication, measles control, and smallpox eradication in India, Brazil, Argentina and Peru.

Dr. Orenstein has served as an Assistant Surgeon General of the U. S. Public Health Service, and he currently serves as chairman of the World Health Organization's Technical Consultative Group on the Global Eradication of Poliomyelitis, as a member and rapporteur of the Pan American Health Organization's Technical Advisory Group on Vaccines and Immunization, as a member of the National Vaccine Advisory Committee, and as a member of the International Editorial Board for the journal Vaccine. He served as an adjunct professor at the Rollins School of Public Health from 1992 until 2002. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Infectious Diseases Society of America, and the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society.

Dr. Orenstein's many honors and awards include the Commendation Medal and the Meritorious Service Medal from the U.S. Public Health Service; the Surgeon General's Exemplary Service Medal; the Excellence in Public Health Award of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials; the Distinguished Service Award from the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society; and in 2003, the Excellence in Public Service Award of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Dr. Orenstein is married to Diane Rauzin Orenstein, and they have two children.

For more information, or to contact Emory University, see their website at: whsc.emory.edu