Dr. Julie L. Gerberding is the former Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and former Administrator of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR).
Before becoming CDC Director and ATSDR Administrator in 2002, Dr. Gerberding was Acting Deputy Director of National Center for Infectious Diseases (NCID), where she played a major role in leading the CDC’s response to the anthrax bioterrorism events of 2002. She joined the CDC in 1998 as Director of the Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion, NCID, where she developed the CDC’s patient safety initiatives and other programs to prevent infections, antimicrobial resistance, and medical errors in healthcare settings. Prior to coming to the CDC, Dr. Gerberding worked at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF), where she was Director of the Prevention Epicenter, a multidisciplinary service, teaching, and research program that focused on preventing infections in patients and their health care providers.
Dr. Gerberding is an Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine (Infectious Diseases) at Emory University and an Associate Professor of Medicine at UCSF. She earned a B.A. magna cum laude in chemistry and biology and an M.D. at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. Dr. Gerberding then completed her internship and residency in internal medicine at UCSF, where she also served as Chief Medical Resident before completing her fellowship in Clinical Pharmacology and Infectious Diseases at UCSF. She earned an M.P.H. degree at the University of California, Berkeley in 1990.
Dr. Gerberding is a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Alpha Omega Alpha (medical honor society), American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI), American College of Physicians, and is a Fellow in the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA). She chaired and co-chaired IDSA's Committee on Professional Development and Diversity and was elected to serve as a member of the Nominations Committee. She is currently co-chair of the Annual Program Committee. Dr. Gerberding is a member of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America, and served on its board for three years.
Dr. Gerberding has served as a member of the CDC’s National Center for Infectious Diseases’ Board of Scientific Counselors, the CDC HIV Advisory Committee, and the Scientific Program Committee, National Conference on Human Retroviruses. She has also been a consultant to the National Institutes of Health, the American Medical Association, the CDC, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the National AIDS Commission, the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, and the World Health Organization.
Dr. Gerberding's editorial activities have included appointments to the Editorial Board of the Annals of Internal Medicine. She was also Associate Editor of the American Journal of Medicine, and served as a peer-reviewer for numerous internal medicine, infectious diseases, and epidemiology journals. Her scientific interests encompass infection prevention and health care quality promotion among patients and their health care providers. She has authored or co-authored more than 120 peer-reviewed publications and textbook chapters and contributed to numerous guidelines and policies relevant to HIV prevention, post-exposure prophylaxis, management of infected health care personnel, and health care-associated infection prevention and control.