

PERSOWN Senior Medical Advisor


Acclaimed Virologist and Former CDC Director
Robert R. Redfield, M.D.
Senior Medical Advisor
Dr. Robert R. Redfield, Senior Medical Advisor to PERSOWN, is an American virologist who most recently served as Director of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, advising the nation during one of the most tumultuous and fast-paced scientific discovery environments of our time, the Covid-19 pandemic.
Dr. Redfield has been a public health leader actively engaged in clinical research and clinical care of chronic human viral infections and infectious diseases, especially HIV, for more than 30 years. In his career, he has experienced three vastly unique and scientifically complex global epidemics: Ebola, HIV/AIDS, and COVID-19. As such, he holds the unique perspective of someone who has played a significant role in finding, studying, and publishing some of the most important scientific discoveries and medical advancements in modern history.
PERSOWN Interview with Dr. Redfield
Accomplishments




Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
While Director of CDC, Redfield’s accomplishments included advancing the presidential initiative to end HIV transmission by 2030, successfully responding to three Ebola epidemics, developing a new program to confront the nation’s opioid epidemic, identifying and responding to Acute Flaccid Myelitis, developing programs to address growing nicotine addiction in children and adolescents, and leading CDC’s COVID19 response as member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force and Operation Warp Speed.
Education and Military Service
Redfield earned the Doctor of Medicine degree from Georgetown University School of Medicine and completed residency at Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC) in Washington, D.C., where he was also enrolled as a U.S. Army officer throughout his clinical research fellowships in infectious diseases and tropical medicine. He served as the founding director of the Department of Retroviral Research within the U.S. Military’s HIV Research Program and retired from the Army as Colonel in 1996.
Research Experience
Following his military service, he co-founded the University of Maryland’s Institute of Human Virology with Dr. William Blattner and Dr. Robert C. Gallo and served as the Chief of Infectious Diseases and Vice Chair of Medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Dr. Redfield made several important early contributions to the scientific understanding of HIV, including the demonstration of the importance of heterosexual transmission, the development of the Walter Reed staging system for HIV infection, and the demonstration of active HIV replication in all stages of HIV infection. He traveled extensively from 2004-2013 throughout Africa and the Caribbean, providing care and treatment to over 700,000 people living with HIV infection. In addition to his research work, Dr. Redfield oversaw an extensive clinical program providing HIV care and treatment to more than 5,000 patients in the Baltimore/Washington, D.C. community.
Advisory Appointments
Dr. Redfield served as a member of the President’s Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS from 2005 to 2009 and was appointed as Chair of the International Subcommittee from 2006 to 2009. He is a past member of the Office of AIDS Research Advisory Council at the National Institutes of Health, the Fogarty International Center Advisory Board at the National Institutes of Health, and the Advisory Anti-Infective Agent Committee of the Food and Drug Administration. Dr. Redfield currently serves as the Senior Public Health Advisor to the State of Maryland.
media
CDC Foundation: Contagious Conversations Podcast
Talking data, disease and the human condition
Dr. Robert Redfield shares his thoughts on how we can eliminate HIV in the United States by 2030, why opioid disorder is the public health crisis of our time, and what it’s like to work with a team that puts science and data into action in the name of public service.


American Medical Association
Dr. Robert Redfield Discusses Importance of Public Health Data with JAMA
Dr. Robert Redfield addresses the importance of working towards an integrated public health data system with Dr. Bauchner of JAMA Network.
C-SPAN
On the C-SPAN Networks:
Robert Redfield M.D. as Director for the CDC with 48 videos in the C-SPAN Video Library; the first appearance was a 1987 House Committee as a Physician for the National Naval Medical Center. The year with the most videos was 2020 with 43 videos. Most appearances with Mike Pence (18), Deborah L. Birx M.D. (17), Anthony S. Fauci M.D. (15).


Center for Strategic & International Studies PODCAST
In Conversation with Dr. Robert Redfield: Part I – CDC’s Commitment to the Polio Endgame
In Conversation with Dr. Robert Redfield: Part II – Combating the Opioid Epidemic
Council on Foreign Relations
A Conversation with Robert Redfield
Dr. Robert Redfield discusses the CDC’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.