The Honorable Raj Panjabi
Dr. Raj Panjabi is a distinguished authority in health care, public policy, entrepreneurship, and technology. Dr. Panjabi is Senior Partner at Flagship Pioneering and on faculty at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.
Panjabi served in the Biden-Harris Administration (2021-2023). As White House Senior Director and Special Assistant to the President, Panjabi served as the top pandemic and health official at the National Security Council. He played a pivotal role in the largest vaccination campaign in history against COVID-19 and responses to public health crises, including Mpox, Influenza and Ebola. He played a lead role executing the 2022 National Biodefense and American Pandemic Preparedness Plans, coordinating over $12 billion in annual investment across 16 federal agencies in biodefense, including in disease surveillance, diagnostics, therapeutics, vaccines and health systems. Panjabi helped oversee implementation of the President’s 2022 Bioeconomy Executive Order, directing federal agencies to drive research and development, streamline regulation, grow manufacturing, and expand markets for biotechnology products, including by leveraging artificial intelligence.
Dr. Panjabi oversaw implementation of the 2022 U.S. Global Health Security Act, authorizing $5 billion and expanding health investments across 50 countries. He co-developed the President’s COVID-19 and health security initiatives with the G7, G20, and regional bodies, including efforts to organize Presidential Summits, launch the Pandemic Fund at the World Bank, negotiate the WHO Pandemic Accord and uphold the UN Biological Weapons Convention.
Panjabi held top healthcare executive roles. Leading the U.S. President’s Malaria Initiative, he helped launch the world’s first malaria vaccine, create a strategy to prevent 1 billion cases and manage a $800 million enterprise protecting 700 million people across 30 countries. For 14 years he was Co-Founder and CEO of Last Mile Health, an enterprise leveraging digital technology to train thousands of healthcare providers serving millions of people.
Dr. Panjabi has cared for outpatients on Medicaid and Medicare in federally qualified health centers pioneering value-based care and inpatients at Mass General Brigham. He has served on numerous boards, councils and commissions. One of TIME’s 100 Most Influential People in the World and TIME’s 50 Most Influential People in Healthcare, he was twice named to the FORTUNE World’s 50 Greatest Leaders list.
All of us at the Commission are in shock and are heartbroken at news that Senator Lieberman has died suddenly and unexpectedly. Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife, Hadassah, their children, and extended family.
We all were the beneficiaries of Joe’s many years of selfless public service, his kindness, and civility. Joe was the definition of a Mensch – a person of great integrity and honor. He always put others first and always worked to better our nation, to which he tirelessly devoted so much of his energy. He had an indefatigable spirit that always pushed our work forward.
For nearly ten years, Joe was my co-chair here at the Bipartisan Commission on Biodefense. He cared deeply about the mission, for sure. Even more, he cared about each of our fellow Commissioners and the staff, all of whom I know are personally grieving at this tremendous loss. May his memory be a blessing.
Tom Ridge
March 27, 2024
