Thomas A. Burke
Professor
Associate Dean for Public Health Practice and Training
Departmental Address
624 North Broadway, Hampton House
Room 429
Research and Professional Experience
Thomas A. Burke is Associate Dean for Public Health Practice and Training and Professor in The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Department of Health Policy and Management, with joint appointments in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences and the School of Medicine Department of Oncology. He is also Director of the Johns Hopkins Risk Sciences and Public Policy Institute. Dr. Burke is Chair of the National Academy of Sciences Committee on Improving Risk Analysis and in 2006 he was named a Fellow of the Society for Risk Analysis. His research interests include environmental epidemiology and surveillance, evaluation of population exposures to environmental pollutants, assessment and communication of environmental risks, and application of epidemiology and health risk assessment to public policy. He was Principal Investigator for the Pew Environmental Health Commission which established the framework for a national approach to environmental public health tracking. He has been awarded the Johns Hopkins Golden Apple Award for excellence in teaching four times.
Before joining the University faculty, Dr. Burke was Deputy Commissioner of Health for the State of New Jersey and Director of Science and Research for the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. In New Jersey, he directed initiatives that influenced the development of national programs, such as Superfund, the Safe Drinking Water Act, and the Toxics Release Inventory.
Dr. Burke has served as a member of the National Academy of Sciences Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology and chaired the NAS Committee on Human Biomonitoring for Environmental Toxicants and Committee on Toxicants and Pathogens in Biosolids Applied to Land. He also served on the NAS Committee on the Toxicological Effects of Methylmercury. In 2003 he was named a lifetime National Associate of the National Academies. He was Inaugural Chair of the Advisory Committee to the Director of the CDC National Center for Environmental Health and a member of the Executive Committee of the EPA Board of Scientific Counselors.
Dr. Burke received his BS from St. Peter's College, his MPH from the University of Texas and his PhD in epidemiology from the University of Pennsylvania.
Keywords
environmental health policy; risk assessment and communication; environmental epidemiology; health policy and management
