Lisa A. Cooper, MD, MPH is the James F. Fries Professor of Medicine and a Bloomberg Distinguished Professor at Johns Hopkins University Schools of Medicine, Nursing, and Bloomberg School of Public Health. She is also the Founder and Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Equity.  Dr. Cooper studies how race and socioeconomic factors shape patient care, and how health systems, with communities, can improve the health of populations that experience health disparities.  An internal medicine physician, epidemiologist, and health services researcher, Dr. Cooper and her team partner with health systems and community-based organizations, to identify interventions that alleviate health disparities and translate them into practice and policy changes that improve community health.

Dr. Cooper is a 2007 MacArthur Fellow and an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine. She is also a recipient of the Herbert W. Nickens Award for outstanding contributions to promoting social justice in medical education and equity in health care from the Association of American Medical Colleges, the Helen Rodriguez-Trias Social Justice Award from the American Public Health Association, and a Distinguished Scientist Award from the American Heart Association. Dr. Cooper is the author of the book, “Why Are Health Disparities Everyone’s Problem?” (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2021).  In September 2021, she was appointed by President Biden to the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.