John F. Modlin, M.D. holds the title of Professor of Pediatrics and Medicine (Emeritus) at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth where he was Chair of the Department of Pediatrics and Senior Advising Dean before taking a position with the Polio team the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation from 2013 to 2019. Dr. Modlin graduated from Duke University School of Medicine in 1971, completed pediatric residency and infectious diseases fellowship training at Boston Children’s Hospital, served as an Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and held subsequent faculty positions at Harvard, Johns Hopkins, and Dartmouth. His career interests include perinatal viral infections, enterovirus infections, poliovirus immunization, vaccine development, and immunization policy.
Dr. Modlin’s early clinical observations and experimental studies focused on perinatal enterovirus infections. Following the emergence of HIV disease, he contributed to early antiviral treatment trials as a member of the Pediatric AIDS Clinical Trials Group, including the pivotal 049 and 076 studies that demonstrated for the first time that mother to infant HIV transmission could be prevented by antiviral therapy. At Johns Hopkins, Dr. Modlin designed and led clinical trials of IPV, OPV and the combination of both vaccines to assess humoral and mucosal immunity to poliovirus infection, research that was instrumental in the decision to change polio vaccination policy in the United States in the late 1990s. At the Gates Foundation, he worked with a global consortium of virologists and vaccine trialists to develop novel, genetically stable oral poliovirus vaccines in support of the polio eradication initiative.
Among other leadership positions, Dr. Modlin has served as Chair of the FDA Antiviral Drugs Advisory Committee, Chair of the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, and Chair of the FDA Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee. He has authored or co-authored more than 250 peer-reviewed papers in the medical literature. He recently was awarded the 2023 D.A. Henderson Award for Contributions to Public Health by the Infectious Disease Society of America.
Specialty : Pediatric ID
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