protecting the fetus and the child
from environmental hazards

a healthy environment
for all children

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Richard J. Jackson MD MPH

In June 2005, Dr. Richard J. Jackson received the Presidential Distinguished Executive Award from President Bush for his outstanding leadership and extraordinary achievement in service to the nation, and in particular to improving environmental public health.  He is currently Professor of Environmental Health at the University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health. He has served in many leadership positions with the California Health Department, including as the State Health Officer answering to Governor Schwarzenegger.  For nine years he was director of the Center of Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) National Center for Environmental Health in Atlanta.

Jackson's career course has led him through the North Jersey Schools, the Jesuit novitiate, Medical School and Pediatric training in San Francisco, and public health training at CDC and at Berkeley.

While in California he carried out investigations that led to strengthening of farm worker health protection, food safety and child health.  His work led to the establishment of the California Birth Defects Monitoring Program and state and national laws that removed the licenses for a series of dangerous pesticides.  In the Federal Government at CDC, he worked for the addition of folic acid to food to prevent birth defects, established the national asthma epidemiology and control programs, and oversaw the childhood lead poisoning prevention programs. He instituted the current federal effort to “biomonitor” chemical levels in the US population. He was the US lead under several US government efforts around health and environment in Russia, including radiation threats,  one of which led to the addition of iodine to salt there and the prevention of many cases of retardation.  In the late 1990s he was the CDC leader in establishing the US National Pharmaceutical Stockpile to prepare for terrorism and other disasters—which was activated on September 11, 2001.

Dick Jackson is co-author of the book Urban Sprawl and Public Health, a 2004 book from Island Press.  He has served on many medical and health boards, and in September 2005 he was selected to serve on the Board of Directors of the national American Institute of Architects AIA).  His strongest public health interest is in developing the next generation of leaders in Public Health. 

6/27/2006