People in the News

Varmus appointed NCI director

President Obama has appointed Dr. Harold Varmus, president of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan, to serve as director of the National Cancer Institute beginning in mid-July. Varmus, a former director of the NIH, won a Nobel Prize for his work on the genetic basis of cancer.

Dr. Harold Varmus

Dr. Anthony Lake

Lake appointed UNICEF director

Dr. Anthony Lake, a foreign policy advisor to several U.S. presidents, has been appointed executive director of UNICEF, which works to advance children's rights around the world. The National Security Advisor under President Bill Clinton, Lake served for nine years on the board of the U.S. Fund for UNICEF, and chaired it from 2004 to 2007. Immediately prior to this appointment, Lake served as distinguished professor of diplomacy at Georgetown University.

Alexander honored by American Academy of Pediatrics

Dr. Duane Alexander, Fogarty’s senior scientific adviser for global maternal and child health research, has received the American Academy of Pediatrics President’s Award for Outstanding Service. As director of The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, he helped cut sudden infant death syndrome cases in half and virtually eliminated a type of meningitis in the U.S. with a new vaccine.

Dr. Duane Alexander

Dr. Arun Chockalingam

Chockalingam is new director, NHLBI global health

Dr. Arun Chockalingam is the new director, Office of Global Health at the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. Author of more than 150 papers and 11 book chapters, he comes to NIH from Canada’s Simon Fraser University, where he served as director of continuing public health education. In addition to a career in cardiovascular epidemiology, Chockalingam has worked in global health research, policy, training and administration. 

Blander receives educational leader award

Dr. Jeffrey Blander, a past Fogarty Clinical Scholar, was honored with an Emerging Educational Leader Award by Olympus, a precision technology company known for cameras as well as medical and surgical products. The award recognizes Blander for inspiring students to think innovatively and as an individual with potential to make important contributions to his field. Blander teaches global health technology in a Harvard-MIT program.

Dr. Jeffrey Blander