Our Faculty

David Rosner, PhD, MPH, focuses on research at the intersection of public health and social history and the politics of occupational disease and industrial pollution. He has been actively involved in lawsuits on behalf of cities, states and communities around the nation who are trying to hold the lead industry accountable for past acts that have resulted in tremendous damage to America's children. Cases aimed at removing lead from children's environments and compensating parents and governmental agencies for the costs of care and abatement of hazards in the home environment have grown out of his academic work. His work on the history of industry understanding the harms done by their industrial toxins has been part of law suits on behalf of asbestos workers and silicosis victims as well.

Prior to joining the Columbia faculty in 1998, Dr. Rosner was University Distinguished Professor of History at the City University of New York. In 2010, he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine. In addition to numerous grants, he has been a Guggenheim Fellow, a recipient of a Robert Wood Johnson Investigator Award, a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow and a Josiah Macy Fellow. He has been awarded the Distinguished Scholar's Prize from the City University and the Viseltear Prize for Outstanding Work in the History of Public Health from the APHA, among others. Dr. Rosner has also been honored by the New York Committee on Occupational Safety and Health and, with Gerald Markowitz, was awarded the Upton Sinclair Memorial Lectureship "For Outstanding Occupational Health, Safety, and Environmental Journalism by the American Industrial Hygiene Association." Dr. Rosner is an author of many books on occupational disease, epidemics and public health. Lead Wars: The Politics of Science and the Fate of America?s Children, (University of California Press/Milbank Fund, 2013) details the recent conflicts at Johns Hopkins over studies of children placed in homes with low level lead exposure and what it says about public health research.

PhD, Harvard University, 1978

MPH, University of Massachusetts, 1972

BA, City College of New York, 1968

Mailman School Affiliations:

• Center for the History and Ethics of Public Health 

University Affiliations:

• Institute for Social and Economic Research and Policy
• Center for the Study of Science and Religion  Advisory Board
• Department of History  Professor

Additional Affiliations:

• Member, Institute of Medicine
• APHA Governing Council, 1994-1996
• Chair, Viseltear Committee, APHA Medical Care, 1991-2000
• Member, Sigma Xi, Honorary Science Society
• Contributing Editor, Public Health Reports, 2002-
• Editorial Board, Journal of Public Health Policy, 1999-

• RWJ Health Policy Investigator Award, 2002-2005
• Arthur Viseltear Award, Medical Care Section, APHA, 2000
• Guggenheim Fellow, 1987-1988
• NEH Fellow, 1983-1984
• Upton Sinclair Award, American Industrial Hygiene Association, 2005

Selected Editorial Boards

• Editorial Board, Public Health Reports
• Editorial Board, Journal of Public Health Policy
• Editorial Board, University of Rochester Press series on the history of public health

September 11th and Public Health
Dr. Rosner has organized and written reports on September 11th and its impact on public health infrastructure for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Milbank Fund. The Milbank Fund published three of his special reports. His recent book, Are We Ready: Public Health since 9/11 was published by the University of California Press/Milbank in 2006.

Author of books on NYC
Dr. Rosner is the author of A Once Charitable Enterprise: Hospitals and Health Care in Brooklyn and New York (Cambridge University Press). Author of: Children, Race and Power, (Routledge Press) Editor of:"Hives of Sickness: Epidemics and Public Health in New York City

Television, Radio and Movie Documentaries on New York City
Dr. Rosner has been on numerous radio programs including All Things Considered, Tell me More, Radiolab, Morning Edition and other NPR and BBC broadcasts. He has also appeared in NOVA?s documentary The Most Dangerous Woman in the World: Typhoid Mary. ABC's "Do You Know Who You Are?"; NBCs "Dateline;" and other European newscasts. He was also interviewed for a Greater New York Hospital Association documentary on New York Hospitals. Also, his work and he were featured on Bill Moyers' PBS Special: "Trade Secrets" and an HBO special, "Blue Vinyl."

Lectures in UK
Dr. Rosner was a keynote speaker at an international conference on the medical humanities and ethics at the University College London in September 2004. Also, he is the Edward and Amalie Kass Lecturer University College London; also lecturer, University at Exeter

Countries: United Kingdom

IREX Program on Eastern Europe and EHESS Program in Paris
Dr. Rosner was one of a number of historians invited to a two-week seminar with Hungarian historians. Also Visiting Faculty, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris, France.

Countries: France

International Silicosis Project
This is a project on the international comparison of an occupational disease, silicosis. It is headquartered in Paris, France and grew out of a lecture Rosner gave at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales.

Countries: France