Career And Contributions
Prof. K. Srinath Reddy is an Honorary Distinguished Professor at the Public Health Foundation of India. He is the past President of, the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI) and formerly headed the Department of Cardiology at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). He was appointed as the First Bernard Lown Visiting Professor of Cardiovascular Health at the Harvard School of Public Health in (2009-13) and presently serves as an Adjunct Professor of Epidemiology at Harvard (2014-2023). He is also an Adjunct Professor of the Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, Honorary Professor of Medicine at the University of Sydney and Adjunct Professor of Medical Ethics and Health Policy in the Associated Faculty of the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. PHFI is engaged in capacity building in Public Health in India through education, training, research, policy development, health communication and advocacy. In March 2017, he was appointed as Advisor on Health to the Government of Odisha, with the rank of a Cabinet Minister. He is also an Advisor on Health to Government of Andhra Pradesh, with Cabinet Rank from March 2020. He served as physician to two Prime Ministers of India. Professor Reddy is a member of the Government of India Technical Taskforce for Covid-19. He is also an Advisor to the Governments of Punjab and Andhra Pradesh.
Prof. Reddy obtained his medical degree from Osmania Medical College (Hyderabad), M.D. (Medicine) and D.M. (Cardiology) degrees from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (Delhi) and M.Sc. (Epidemiology) from McMaster University (Hamilton, Canada). Having trained in cardiology and epidemiology, Prof. Reddy has been involved in several major international and national research studies including the INTERSALT global study of blood pressure and electrolytes, INTERHEART global study on risk factors of myocardial infarction, national collaborative studies on epidemiology of coronary heart disease and community control of rheumatic heart disease. Widely regarded as a leader of preventive cardiology at national and international levels, Prof. Reddy has been a researcher, teacher, policy enabler, advocate and activist who has worked to promote cardiovascular health, tobacco control, appropriate nutrition across the life course, chronic disease prevention and healthy living across the lifespan. He edited the National Medical Journal of India for 10 years and is on editorial board of several international and national journals. He has more than 570 scientific publications in international and Indian peer reviewed-journals and published a book Make Health in India: Reaching A Billion Plus.
He has served on many WHO expert panels and has been the President of the World Heart Federation (2013-14). He chaired the Core Advisory Group on Health and Human Rights for the National Human Rights Commission of India for several years and was a member of the first National Science and Engineering Research Board of Government of India. He chaired the High Level Expert Group on Universal Health Coverage, set up by the Planning Commission of India. He has also served as the President of the National Board of Examinations which deals with post-graduate medical education in India.
Prof. Reddy is a member of the Leadership Council of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (ww.unsdsn.org), established to assist the United Nations in developing the post-2015 goals for sustainable development. He chairs the Thematic Group on Health in the SDSN. Prof. Reddy is a member of the Global Panel on Agriculture and Food Systems for Nutrition. He also Co-chaired the Health Ministry Steering Committee on Health Related Effects of Air Pollution. He has served as member of the Lancet Commissions on : Health Professional Education for the 21st Century; Investing in Health; Alleviating the access abyss in palliative care and pain relief; High Quality Health Systems.
Awards
His contributions to public health have been recognized through several awards and honours. They include: WHO Director General’s Award for Outstanding Global Leadership in Tobacco Control (World Health Assembly, 2003), Padma Bhushan (Presidential Honour, India, 2005), Queen Elizabeth Medal (Royal Society for Health Promotion, UK, 2005), Luther Terry Medal for Leadership in Tobacco Control (American Cancer Society, 2009), Membership of the US National Academies (Institute of Medicine, 2005), Fellowship of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (2009), Fellowship of the Faculty of Public Health, UK (2009).
He was awarded Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) conferred by University of Aberdeen, Scotland (2011), Dr. NTR Medical University, India (2011), University of Lausanne, Switzerland (2012), and University of Glasgow, Scotland (2013) and Doctor of Literature (Honoris Causa) conferred by the Jodhpur National University, India (2013), Doctor of Science (Medicine), Honoris Causa, University of London, UK (2014) & Doctor of Science, ILBS University, India (2019). He was the first Indian to be elected as an International Member of the US National Academy of Medicine (formerly the Institute of Medicine) and the third Indian whose name engraved on the wall of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine as a Fellow, in its 120-year history.
Orations
He has delivered more than 50 invited orations/lectures which include: Cutter Lecture (Harvard, 2006), Koplan Lecture (CDC, 2008), Gopalan Oration (2009), Ramalingaswami Oration (2010), Paul Dudley White Lecture (American Heart Association, 2010), Sheth Lecture (Emory, 2012), Philip Poole Wilson Memorial Oration (AIIMS-UKIERI, 2012), Sir John Wilson Oration (IAPB,2012), C. Ramachandran Memorial Lecture (2013), GRIPMER Oration (2014), Yale lecture (2015), Alan Bernstein Distinguished Lecture (Canada, 2015); Milton J. Rosenau Lecture (Harvard, 2015); Jermiah Stamler Lecture (World Congress of Cardiology, 2016), Dr. Ida S. Scudder Humanitarian Oration (2016), Prof. P.N. Mari Bhatt Memorial Lecture (2017), Dr. B.C. Dasgupta Memorial Lecture (2017). Foundation Day Lecture of the National Institute of Medical Statistics (2018). H.M. Patel Memorial Lecture (2019).
Literary Awards
He has also won prestigious literary awards such as: the Global Peace Essay contest organized by Economists Allied for Arms Reduction – ECAAR – and judged by 9 Nobel Laureates and the Times of India Essay contest on Human Rights and Media. He was a prize winning debater and quizzer at school and college levels. He has widely published op-eds in many Indian newspapers on medical, public health and general topics.