Providence, RI Staff
Anne De Groot, MD
Scientific Director and Founder
Elizabeth Closson, BA
Interim- Director
Bamako, Mali Staff
Karamoko Tounkara, MD
Program Director
Ramatoullaye Yattassaye
Patient Coordinator
Board of Directors
Co-Chairpersons
Sophie Sprecht
Robert S. Morris
Directors
Elaine Fain, MD
Elizabeth George, Esq
Bunny Harvey
Ned Heltzer, Pharm.D
Anna MacGregor Robin
Elizabeth Perkins, Esq
Betty Rider, FACHE
Jeffrey T. Safrit, PhD
William H. Twaddell
Meg E. Wirth
Scientific Board
Ben Aboubacar, MD
Millenium Village Project
Robert Bollinger MD
Johns Hopkins University
Marc Girard, PhD
Vaccine Research Consultant
Anne Hosmalin MD PhD
Inst. Cochin de Genetique Molec.
Youssouf Issabré PhD
Director General, Fond. Mérieux Mali
Ousmane Koita, LMBA, FAST
University of Bamako
Neal Nathanson MD
University of Pennsylvania
Kenneth Mayer MD
Warren Alpert School of Medicine of Brown University
Janet McNicholl MD
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Thailand
Sarah Rowland-Jones MD
Oxford University
Patricia Symonds, PhD
Brown University
Board Biographies
Board of Directors
Elaine B. Fain, MD
Internal Medicine
Dr. Elaine B. Fain practices general Internal Medicine in the Providence area. She has long been involved in community projects and community health issues. Born in Providence RI, she is a graduate of Brown University,
the Harvard School of Public Health and the Columbia University College
of Physicians and Surgeons. She is a Clinical Instructor in the
Department of Medicine at Brown Medical School.
In the medical community she has served on the Executive Committee of
the RI Medical Society and is a former President of the RI Medical
Women's Association (RIMWA) and the Providence Medical Society. In 1993
she was honored as the RI Woman Physician of the Year by RIMWA and in
1994 received a Community Service Award by the American Medical Women's
Association. Dr. Fain's interest in HIV began in 1982 when she helped
diagnose the first case of HIV in Rhode Island. A passionate traveler, she's since visited facilities caring for HIV patients in Europe and Africa. She is thrilled to be part of GAIA because of what GAIA brings to Mali:
a grassroots program of education, treatment and /prevention and
immunization against HIV. Further, she is thrilled with what GAIA
brings to Rhode Island: the ability for local people here to learn more about Mali, to be continually updated about cutting edge AIDS research, and to directly contribute to a community effort in West Africa.
Elizabeth M. George, Esq
Liz George is employed as an in-house legal counsel with the CIGNA Corporation. She graduated from Smith College
with a B.A. in 1978, and earned her law degree from the University of
Connecticut Law School in 1981. She has worked in community legal
services and taught mental health law at the University of Connecticut
Law School. Attorney George acted as a staff
attorney for health care matters with the State of Connecticut
Department of Health Services, and became a partner at Spak &
George before joining the CIGNA Legal Department in 1993. Ms. George is
a member of both the Massachusetts and Connecticut State Bars, and the Bar in the Federal District Court, District of Connecticut. She is also a member of the American Health Lawyers Association.
Ned E. Heltzer
Drug Management Consultant
Ned
Heltzer is a Principal Program Associate at Management Sciences for
Health, a leading international organization dedicated to closing the
gap between knowledge and action in public health. As part of MSH's
Center for Pharmaceutical Management, he provides pharmaceutical
technical assistance relative to HIV/AIDS and essential drug programs
in several developing countries. Previously, he directed pharmaceutical
management activities for numerous State and local correctional
institutions throughout the United States.
Anna Macgregor Robin
Anna Macgregor Robin has been writing and performing for television, stage and film, for fifteen years. During ten years in Los Angeles,
Anna earned membership in both the Writers and Screen Actors Guilds.
Anna now works with Cutler and Company, a communications and public
relations firm in Providence, Rhode Island, and co-hosts "The Mother of All Shows" on talk radio WHJJ am in Providence. She and her husband Andrew have two children.
Betty Rider, MA, MS, FACHE
Healthcare Administrator
Betty's
has had more than 25 years of experience as a healthcare administrator,
including clinical operations experience in complex healthcare
environments including academic medicine, specialty hospitals, military
medicine, correctional healthcare, and healthcare analytics and care
management. She has been recognized for her ability to develop and
implement strategic initiatives targeted to performance improvement,
patient safety, clinical program development, contract negotiations,
and strategic planning. The author of over 50 publications, Ms. Rider's
current work has focused the relationships between unwarranted
variations and quality care. Ms. Rider received her B.A. in Social
Science from Trinity University, M.A. in Psychology from Eastern Kentucky University, and M.S. in Healthcare Administration from Trinity University. She is board certified by the American College of Healthcare Executives, a member of the Executive Committee of the Triangle Chapter of the ACHE. She resides in Hillsborough, North Carolina with her partner, Dr. Kris Herfkens.
Jeffrey T. Safrit, PhD
Program Director, Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation
Dr.
Safrit, Program Director of Research at the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric
AIDS Foundation and Visiting Assistant Professor at UCLA, joined the
GAIA Board in 2002. Dr. Safrit, author of more
than 35 scientific articles, currently leads the Research Department
efforts at the Foundation office in Santa Monica, CA.
The Foundation also has offices in DC and in 10 African Countries. Dr.
Safrit received his Ph.D. in Immunology from UCLA moving on to work at
the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center in New York. In 2001, after spending 3 years at Emory University's Vaccine Research Center,
the desire to accomplish more on a global scale brought Dr. Safrit to
the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation. Today the Foundation
conducts programs in over 900 sites and 18 countries around the world
including basic and preclinical HIV vaccine work.
William H. Twaddell
Former U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria
Bill Twaddell has been a member of GAIA's board since its inception and was its second President until June 2006. He grew up in Providence and graduated from Brown University
in 1963. He served for 31 years in the U.S. Diplomatic Corps, following
successive two year stints in the Peace Corps, U.S. Army Corps and
Press Corps (New York Daily News, Washington Bureau). Most of his
foreign service career was involved with African affairs where he was
Ambassador to Nigeria, Liberia and the Islamic Republic of Mauritania;
Chief of Mission in Mozambique, Namibia and Guinea-Bissau; and, Deputy
Chief of Mission in Bamako, Mali. Since his retirement in 2000, as well
as his association with GAIA, he has sat on the boards of Brown University and the International Institute of Rhode Island.
Scientific Advisors
Robert C. Bollinger, MD
Johns Hopkins University
Dr.
Bollinger, MD is a Professor of Infectious Diseases in the Department
of Medicine of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, with a joint
appointment in the Department of International Health of the Bloomberg
School of Public Health. He has more than 27 years of experience in
international public health, clinical research and education in a broad
range of global health priorities including HIV/AIDS, malaria,
tuberculosis, leprosy and emerging infections. His initial experience
in public health in India was in 1979 and included field work with a leprosy control project in rural Bihar.
Over the past 14 years, he has initiated and conducted a large
collaborative Indo-US HIV research program in Pune, with the National
AIDS Research Institute/ICMR and the BJ Medical College. His ongoing
public health research, includes additional collaborative projects in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
Dr. Bollinger is also the Country Director for the Hopkins Fogarty International Programs in India and DRC (http://www.jhsph.edu/fogartyaids/index.html), which has provided short-term and degree public health training to more than 80 visiting scientists at Hopkins, as well as in-country training for more than 2000 scientists, since 1992. Dr. Bollinger is the Director of the recently established Hopkins Center for Clinical Global Health Education (www.ccghe.jhmi.edu) which develops and provides clinical education to health care providers in resource limited settings around the world. Under Dr. Bollinger's leadership, the CCGHE is currently undertaking and establishing public health and clinical educational programs for physicians and nurses in India, Ethiopia, Zambia, Uganda and Panama. Dr. Bollinger is also Associate Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Global Health, which coordinates all international health education and research at Johns Hopkins University.
Dr. Bollinger is also an active clinician/educator, who provides and supervises HIV and infectious diseases clinical care, in the outpatient and in-patient settings at Johns Hopkins Hospital. In addition to his teaching, research and clinical responsibilities, Dr. Bollinger has contributed to many public health training programs, expert committees and consultations in the US, Botswana, Brazil, India, Japan, Pakistan, Panama, Senegal, South Africa, South Korea, Thailand and Uganda, including a recent appointment to the US Presidential Advisory Council for HIV/AIDS (PACHA), where he also serves as a member of the PACHA International Sub-committee. Dr. Bollinger received his undergraduate degree in Philosophy and Chemistry from Haverford College, his Doctor of Medicine from Dartmouth Medical School and his Masters in Public Health from the Department of International Health at Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. He is Board Certified in Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases from the American Board of Internal Medicine, having received internal medicine training at the University of Maryland Medical Systems and a Post-doctoral Fellowship in Infectious Diseases from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Dr. Bollinger has been on the faculty at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and Public Health since 1992.
Anne Hosmalin, MD, PhD
Institut Cochin de Génétique Moléculaire
Anne Hosmalin, MD, PhD, is Research Director (equivalent to Professor) at the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in France. She heads a research team on Antigen presentation by dendritic cells at the Cochin Institute in Paris.
Co-director of the Immunology Department of the Institute, she also
heads the Action Coordonnée 31 of the National Agency for AIDS Research
(ANRS) on Dendritic cells, antigen presentation and innate immunity.
Kenneth H. Mayer, MD
Brown University
Kenneth H. Mayer, MD, is Professor of Medicine and Community Health at Brown University, Director of the Brown University AIDS Program, and Attending Physician in the Infectious Diseases Division of the Miriam Hospital in Providence, Rhode Island. In addition, he is an Adjunct Professor at Harvard University's School of Public Health and Medical Research Director at Boston's Fenway Community Health Center,
where, since 1983, he has conducted studies of HIV's natural history
and transmission. In the early 1980s, as a research fellow studying
infectious diseases at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Dr. Mayer was one
of the first clinical researchers in New England to care for patients living with AIDS. Dr. Mayer is the Director of the Brown and Tufts Universities'
Fogarty (NIH) AIDS International Research and Training Program, which
has trained more than 50 laboratory and clinical investigators from East Asia. Dr. Mayer has worked increasingly in India
and participated in many regional conferences on biological and
behavioral approaches to prevention research, and the development of
community-based clinical research activities in Asia.
Dr. Mayer also co-edited The Emergence of AIDS: Impact on Immunology,
Microbiology, and Public Health, published in November 2000 by the
American Public Health Association Press. Dr. Mayer has served on the
Data Safety and Monitoring Board of the NIH's AIDS Clinical Trials
Group and sits on several editorial boards of scientific publications,
including: Clinical Infectious Diseases. He has co-authored more than
300 articles, chapters and other publications on AIDS and related
infectious disease topics, and is a frequent lecturer and presenter at
national and international conferences and symposia. Dr. Mayer received
his B.A. in Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and his M.D. from Northwestern University Medical School. He completed his residency and internship in Internal Medicine at Boston's Beth Israel Hospital, while also holding clinical fellowships in medicine at Harvard Medical School and subsequently, spent 3 years doing an Infectious Diseases Fellowship at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School from 1980 to 1983. Dr. Mayer lives in Boston, MA
Neal Nathanson, MD
University of Pennsylvania
Dr.
Neal Nathanson is currently the Associate Dean for Global Health
Programs, at the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center. In July,
2003, Dr. Nathanson retired as Vice Provost for Research, at the University of Pennsylvania,
in, having served since December, 2000 responsible for oversight of the
whole research enterprise of the University. From July, 1998 to
September, 2000, Dr. Nathanson served as Director of the Office of AIDS
Research (OAR) at the National Institutes of Health responsible for
coordinating the scientific, budgetary, legislative, and policy
components of the NIH AIDS research programs, as well as for promoting
collaborative research activities in domestic and international
settings.
Dr. Nathanson was educated at Harvard University where he received both a BS and an MD degree, followed by clinical training in internal medicine at the University of Chicago and postdoctoral training in virology at the Johns Hopkins University. Early in his career, Dr. Nathanson spent two years at the Centers for Disease Control, where he headed the Poliomyelitis Surveillance Unit. Later he joined the faculty of the Johns Hopkins Schools of Medicine and Public Health, where he became Professor and head of the Division of Infectious Diseases in the Department of Epidemiology. He then moved to the University of Pennsylvania where he chaired the Department of Microbiology for 15 years, finally serving for two years as Vice Dean for Research and Research Training. Dr. Nathanson is particularly known for his contributions to the field of viral pathogenesis, having edited the definitive text on this subject. He has also made significant contributions to the epidemiology of viral diseases.
Sarah Rowland-Jones, MD
Oxford University
Sarah Rowland-Jones qualified in medicine from Cambridge and Oxford Universities, and trained in Infectious Diseases in London and Oxford.
She began her research career in Oxford with a doctorate supervised by
Professor Andrew McMichael on the role of cellular immune responses to
viral infections, and continued her research career as an MRC Clinician
Scientist and subsequently as an MRC Senior Fellow. Since then she has
led a research group in the MRC Human Immunology Unit in the Weatherall
Institute of Molecular Medicine in Oxford,
studying the role played by cytotoxic T-cells in determining the
outcome of HIV infection. A key focus of the work has been the study of
immune responses to HIV in highly exposed but apparently uninfected
people, most notably sex workers in Nairobi and the Gambia,
and more recently in infants exposed to HIV at birth and through
breast-feeding. She was one of the first investigators to demonstrate
that many highly exposed persistently seronegative subjects have
circulating HIV-specific cytotoxic T-cells, a finding which has
stimulated the development of CTL-inducing vaccines to prevent HIV
infection. In 1997 she received an Elizabeth Glaser Scientist Award
from the Paediatric AIDS Foundation. The Oxford group, which is now
co-led by Dr. Tao Dong, also studies the cellular immune responses to
dengue and influenza virus infections.