Sandro Galea

Sandro Galea (born 1971) is a physician, epidemiologist, and author. He is the Robert A. Knox professor and dean at the Boston University School of Public Health. He is the former Chair of Epidemiology at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. Prior to his academic career in public health, Dr. Galea practiced emergency medicine in Canada and served in Somalia with Doctors Without Borders. 

He was named one of TIME magazine's epidemiology innovators in 2006 and Thomson Reuters listed him as one of the “World's Most Influential Scientific Minds” for the social sciences in 2015. Dr. Galea is past-president of the Society for Epidemiologic Research and an elected member of the American Epidemiological Society. He was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2012 and chaired two of the IOM's most recent reports on mental health in the military. 

Dr. Galea serves frequently on advisory groups to national and international organizations. He formerly served as chair of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene's Community Services Board and as member of its Health Board. Galea's scholarship has been at the intersection of social and psychiatric epidemiology, with a focus on the behavioral health consequences of trauma, including those caused by firearms. 

He has published more than 800 scientific journal articles, 50 chapters, and 13 books, and his research has been featured extensively in current periodicals and newspapers. His latest book, Pained, was published by Oxford University Press in March 2020. Galea trained as a physician at the University of Toronto. He went on to earn a master's degree in public health at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and a DrPH at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

Dr. Galea was named the dean of the Boston University School of Public Health effective January 1, 2015. On January 1, 2010, Galea joined the Mailman School as the Chair of the Department of Epidemiology and as the Anna Cheskis Gelman and Murray Charles Gelman Professor of Epidemiology. Under the leadership of Galea, the Department of Epidemiology reorganized and consolidated its work in its core area areas of strength, building its research and teaching portfolio in chronic disease, infectious disease, injury, lifecourse, psychiatric/neurological, and social epidemiology. 

The Department also launched several new cross-cutting programs, including the Global Mental Health Program, efforts aimed at translation of public health research and educational initiatives, including the Epidemiology and Population Health Summer Institute and the Executive MS program. Prior to his tenure at Columbia, he was on the faculty at both the University of Michigan School of Public Health and Medical School. He also held a leadership position at the New York Academy of Medicine.