Biography

Rear Admiral Ali S. Khan is currently an Assistant Surgeon General and the Acting Director of the National Center for Zoonotic, Vector-borne, and Enteric Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], Department of Health and Human Services. He joined CDC and the US Public Health Service Commissioned Corps in 1991 as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer and over the past decade has responded to and led numerous high profile domestic and international public health emergencies including hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, Ebola hemorrhagic fever, monkeypox, avian influenza, Rift Valley fever, severe acute respiratory syndrome [SARS], the Asian Tsunami, and the initial public health response to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.

In 1999, he served as one of the main architects of CDC’s public health bioterrorism preparedness program which upgraded local, state, and national public health systems to detect and rapidly respond to bioterrorism. As Deputy Director of this new program he created the Critical Agent list, which has remained the basis for all biological terrorism preparedness; published the first national public health preparedness plan; initiated syndrome-based surveillance; and designed the key focus areas to improve local and state capacities. These preparedness efforts were crucial in limiting the scope of the first anthrax attack during which he directed the CDC operational response in Washington, D.C.

Dr. Khan’s professional career has focused on bioterrorism, global health, and emerging infectious diseases. While serving as the interim Director for CDC’s global infectious disease activities he designed CDC’s joint field epidemiology and laboratory training program. He helped design and implement the new $1.2 billion 5-year President’s Malaria Initiative and has been engaged in guinea worm eradication activities. More recently, he has spear-headed BioPHusion as a new public health initiative to improve knowledge exchange, integration, and delivery for all public health practitioners.

Khan (left) on site in Zaire during monkeypox outbreak, surrounded by liquid nitrogen.

Dr. Khan received his MD from Downstate Medical Center in his hometown of Brooklyn, NY and completed a joint residency in Internal Medicine and Pediatrics at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor before joining CDC. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American College of Physicians. He has since completed a Masters of Public Health from Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health where he now holds an adjunct Professor appointment and co-directs the Emerging Infections course (Meet the Scientists @ MicrobeWorld). He has over 150 peer-reviewed publications, textbook chapters, editorials, and brief communiqués. He has consulted intensively for multiple US organizations including NASA, Ministries of Health, and the World Health Organization.

Article Posts

• New Brain Disease is Blowing Minds (May 2008)
• Mosquitoes: The World’s Deadliest Animals (May 2008)
• Produce Strikes Back: Salmonella Saintpaul Outbreak (July 2008)
• Novel Arenavirus Causes Mystery Illness in Zambia and South Africa (October 2008)
• Salmonella Saintpaul Outbreak: Epilogue (November 2008)
• CSI Atlanta: Foodborne Outbreak (December 2008)
• A New Twist for Ebola: Reston-Infected Pigs in the Philippines (January 2009)
• Salmonella Typhimurium Outbreak Investigation: Do Not Try This at Home (January 2009)
• Ingredient Driven Outbreaks: The Inside is Bigger Than the Outside (January 2009)
• Imported Marburg Hemorrhagic Fever: One That Got Away (January 2009)
• Food Safety: Need for Speed (February 2009)
• NCIS Atlanta: Severe Rash Illness in Baja (March 2009)
• Clostridium difficile - an Emerging Zoonosis? (April 2009)
• Of Pigs and Men (May 2009)
• One Piece Found in the Marburg Puzzle (August 2009)