RWJF Senior Vice President and UB Grad to Present 2008 Perry Lecture

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- James S. Marks, M.D., M.P.H., senior vice president at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) and a 1973 graduate of the University at Buffalo School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, will be in Buffalo on Oct. 31 to present the 20th Annual J. Warren Perry Lecture.

The lecture, sponsored by the UB School of Public Health and Health Professions, will take place at 1:30 p.m. in 105 Harriman Hall on UB's South (Main Street) Campus. The lecture is made possible by a grant from J. Warren Perry, founding dean of the former UB School of Health Related Professions.

Marks will speak on the topic "Buffalo, the University and the Public's Health." The lecture is free and open to the public.

Director of the Health Group at RWJF, Marks oversees five program and funding areas: Public Health Systems and Infrastructure; Childhood Obesity; Tobacco Policy Research; Addiction, Prevention and Treatment; and Vulnerable Populations.

He also is vice chair of the board of directors of C-Change, an organization composed of key cancer leaders from government, business and nonprofit sectors, whose mission is to eliminate cancer as a public health problem by leveraging the expertise and resources of its members.

Marks joined the RWJF in December 2004, after a decade at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. At the CDC he served as an assistant surgeon general and director of the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion. Throughout his tenure he developed and advanced ways to prevent and detect diseases such as cancer, heart disease and diabetes, and campaigned to reduce tobacco use and the growing obesity epidemic.

Marks did his specialty training in pediatrics at the University of California at San Francisco, and was a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar at Yale University, where he received his M.P.H.

A national leader in public health for 25 years, Marks has served on more than 75 committees devoted to advancing medical sciences, health care and public health. He has published extensively on maternal and child health, health promotion and chronic disease prevention, and has served on many government and nonprofit boards and committees devoted to improving the public's health.

He has received numerous federal, state, and private awards, including the US Public Health Service Distinguished Service Award, the Surgeon General's Award for Distinguished Service, the Association of State and Territorial Chronic Disease Directors' Award for Excellence, the American Cancer Society's Distinguished Service Award, and National Arthritis Foundation's Special Award of Appreciation. He is a member of the Institute of Medicine.

The University at Buffalo is a premier research-intensive public university, a flagship institution in the State University of New York system and its largest and most comprehensive campus. UB's more than 28,000 students pursue their academic interests through more than 300 undergraduate, graduate and professional degree programs. Founded in 1846, the University at Buffalo is a member of the Association of American Universities.