Allan Rosenfield,
Dean, School of Mailman Public Health,
Columbia University
 In "Columbia University - New Strategy to Fight AIDS in Africa" Dr. Allan Rosenfield, dean of the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University, describes the "tsunami that is happening every day in Africa”: the AIDS epidemic, but offers hope that with the wise infusion of support from the U.S. and other European nations we can plausibly hope for victory over this disease within our lifetime. |
Dr. Allan Rosenfield died October 12, 2008. The following biography was written in 2005.
Once he completed medical school and his residency program in obstetrics and gynecology, Allan Rosenfield proceeded directly to Nigeria and launched a distinguished career devoted to the improvement of women's health in the developing world. He is now one of the foremost leaders in reproductive health and widely acclaimed in the U.S. and internationally.
Dr. Rosenfield's monumental contributions to public health are chronicled in "Allan Rosenfield: Doctor to the World." See full article in Winter 2007 issue of P&S (publication of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University).
Allan Rosenfield was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Harvard College and an M.D. degree from the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University. Internship and one year of general surgical residency was completed at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, followed by two years of service in the U.S. Air Force. He then entered the obstetrics and gynecology residency program at Harvard's Boston Lying/In/Free Hospital for Women program in Boston (now the Brigham and Women's Hospital).
Following completion of training in 1966, Dr. Rosenfield spent one year as an instructor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Lagos Teaching Hospital in Nigeria. He then joined the Population Council, serving for six years in Thailand as Medical Advisor for Family Planning and Maternal and Child Health to the Ministry of Public Health, and as representative of the Population Council. He returned to New York to direct an international rural-based maternal and child health and family planning program sponsored by the Population Council.
In 1975, Dr. Rosenfield moved to Columbia University, as professor of Obstetrics-Gynecology and Public Health, founding director of the Center for Population and Family Health, and director of ambulatory care for the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology. Since 1986 he has been Dean of the Mailman School of Public Health and DeLamar Professor of Public Health. Prior to becoming dean, he served for two years as acting chairman of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and continues to be a professor of obstetrics and gynecology.
Dr. Rosenfield is a diplomate of the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology, a fellow of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and an elected member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. He is a member of many scientific and professional organizations and has served on the boards and/or committees of a number of international, national, state and local health-related organizations. He is a member of the boards of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and serves on advisory committees to other national foundations, including the Dyson Foundation and the Open Society Institute/Soros Foundation. He has served as president of the New York Obstetrical Society, president of the Association of Schools of Public Health, chair of the Executive Board of the American Public Health Association, chair of the Scientific and Technical Advisory Committee of WHO's Human Reproduction Programme, and chair of the Boards of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, AVSC International and the Alan Guttmacher Institute. He is currently chairman of the New York State Department of Health AIDS Advisory Council, and chair of AmFAR's Public Policy Committee. He has received numerous honors, including awards from the Government of Thailand, the International Federation of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the Jacobs Institute of Women's Health, the American Public Health Association's Martha May Elliot Award, and Planned Parenthood of New York City.
He has written extensively on domestic and international issues in the fields of population, women's reproductive health, obstetrics and gynecology, human rights and health policy, with 120 publications to date.