Prof. Heymann is Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine; Head of the Centre on Global Health Security at Chatham House and Chairman of the Board, Public Health England. Previously he was the World Health Organization’s Assistant Director-General for Health Security and Environment, and Representative of the Director-General for polio eradication.

From 1998 to 2003 he was Executive Director of the WHO Communicable Diseases Cluster during which he headed the global response to SARS. Before joining WHO, Prof Heymann worked for 13 years as a medical epidemiologist in sub-Saharan Africa on assignment from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) where, as well as supporting ministries of health in research, he participated in the first and second outbreaks of Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever.

Prior to joining CDC, Prof Heymann worked in India for two years in the WHO Smallpox Eradication Programme. He is an elected fellow of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies (United States) and the Academy of Medical Sciences (United Kingdom), and has been awarded several public health awards.

In 2009 Prof Heymann was appointed an honorary Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) for service to global public health.