University of Georgia professor José F. Cordero been selected as a volunteer member of the Biden-Harris agency review team for the Department of Health and Human Services. This team will also review the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

Agency review teams are responsible for understanding the operations of each agency, ensuring a smooth transfer of power, and preparing for President-elect Joe Biden and Vice Kamala President-elect Harris and their cabinet to “hit the ground running on Day One,” according to the Biden-Harris Transition website.

Cordero is the Gordhan and Jinx Patel Distinguished Professor of Public Health and head of the department of epidemiology and biostatistics in UGA’s College of Public Health.

Originally trained as a pediatrician, Cordero has dedicated his career to addressing maternal and child health as well as minority health and health disparities. He currently co-directs the Puerto Rico Test site for Exploring Contamination Threats (PROTECT) Center as well as the Center for Research on Early Childhood Exposure and Development (CRECE), both of which examine how exposure to environmental contaminants contributes to the high rate of preterm birth in Puerto Rico.

For 27 years, Cordero served at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where he focused on improving the health of mothers and children. His most prominent roles were deputy director of the National Immunization Program and founding director of the National Center for Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities. In the U.S. Public Health Service, he attained the rank of assistant surgeon general.

In addition to his research and clinical work, Cordero serves as the executive director of the Puerto Rico Brain Trust for Tropical Diseases Research and Prevention, a group that seeks to facilitate and speed up the development of rapid tests, vaccines, vector control, and prevention strategies for diseases like Zika, Dengue, Chikungunya and others.

Cordero is a former national trustee of the March of Dimes Foundation, a nonprofit organization that works to improve the health of mothers and babies, and he is a longtime member and past president of the Teratology Society, an international and multidisciplinary group of scientists who study birth defects, reproduction and disorders of developmental origin.

Read more on the Biden-Harris transition website.

Posted on December 4, 2020.