Dr. Julie E. Fischer is a global health security and biosecurity professional with more than two decades of experience forging collaborations with a broad range of partners to understand and address biological threats.
Dr. Fischer served as the first Technical Director for Global Health at CRDF Global from 2020-2024, establishing a multidisciplinary, multi-country team to support the mission of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to strengthen partner capacities to prevent, detect, and respond rapidly to emerging disease threats. As an Associate Research Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Georgetown University from 2016-2020, she co-directed the Master’s Program in Biomedical Science Policy and Advocacy, served as the founding co-director of the Center for Global Health Science and Security, and launched the Elizabeth R. Griffin Program at Georgetown, working with researchers, experts and funding partners to promote local, sustainable, and evidence-based biological risk management practices for diagnostic and biomedical research labs. Before she joined Georgetown, Dr. Fischer led global health security programs in the Department of Health Policy and Management at George Washington University’s Milken Institute School of Public Health and at the Stimson Center.
Dr. Fischer has served as a member of the US Department of State’s International Security Advisory Board (ISAB) and the Board of Scientific Counselors for the CDC Office of Readiness and Response. She is a previous Chair and current Board Member of the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) Consortium, a voluntary alliance of non-governmental entities dedicated to promoting values of collaboration, excellence, innovation, and commitment to achieve a world safe and secure from infectious disease threats. Dr. Fischer is a former Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow and American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Congressional Science & Technology Fellow. Dr. Fischer received a PhD in microbiology and immunology from Vanderbilt University and completed postdoctoral training at the University of Washington and the Seattle Biomedical Research Institute.