Former FDA Chief Scientist Jesse L. Goodman Joins Georgetown

WASHINGTON (March 11, 2014) – Georgetown University Medical Center has appointed Jesse L. Goodman, MD, MPH, as founding director of its Center on Medical Product Access, Safety and Stewardship (COMPASS). The new center will address three broad areas of U.S. and global public health importance: medical product safety and security across the global manufacturing supply chain; antimicrobial drug resistance; and access to lifesaving medical products.

Goodman, a member of the Institute of Medicine, was most recently the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Chief Scientist, and is a renowned expert in infectious diseases.

“Jesse brings a wealth of expertise spanning science, medicine, regulation and public health, and has a proven record in addressing pressing public health needs from both the academic and federal sectors,” says Howard J. Federoff, MD, PhD, executive vice president for health sciences at Georgetown University Medical Center and executive dean of the Georgetown School of Medicine. “We look forward to his leadership in this vitally important area.”

In addition to leading COMPASS, Goodman will continue his work in infectious diseases, serving as an attending physician at the Washington DC VA Medical Center and MedStar Georgetown University Hospital. He is being nominated as professor in the department of medicine at Georgetown University School of Medicine.

“I’m excited about the opportunity to fully engage in this long-standing area of need from a robust academic perspective,” Goodman says. “Addressing these complex challenges requires innovation and a broad, multidisciplinary approach involving multiple sectors at the university and beyond. There are scientific, medical, regulatory and policy dimensions, as well as the need to effectively harness and analyze massive data sets.”

After joining the FDA, Goodman founded and co-chaired the first U.S. Task Force to Combat Antimicrobial Resistance and directed the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. In those roles and as FDA’s Chief Scientist from 2009 until February 2014, he worked extensively and collaboratively with industry, academia, government and global public health partners to prepare for and respond to major public health threats including bioterrorism and West Nile Virus, and led the FDA’s response to the 2009 H1N1 pandemic.

Prior to joining the FDA, Goodman was director of the division of infectious diseases and professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota, where his National Institutes of Health-funded laboratory isolated and characterized the causative agent of a new tick-borne disease, known as human granulocytic anaplasmosis.

Goodman received his AB in biology from Harvard College, his MD from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and his MPH from the University of Minnesota.

About Georgetown University Medical Center
Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) is an internationally recognized academic medical center with a three-part mission of research, teaching and patient care (through MedStar Health). GUMC’s mission is carried out with a strong emphasis on public service and a dedication to the Catholic, Jesuit principle of cura personalis — or “care of the whole person.” The Medical Center includes the School of Medicine and the School of Nursing & Health Studies, both nationally ranked; Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, designated as a comprehensive cancer center by the National Cancer Institute; and the Biomedical Graduate Research Organization, which accounts for the majority of externally funded research at GUMC including a Clinical and Translational Science Award from the National Institutes of Health.

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