Atlanta International Health Fellowship Endowment

In 1984, Drs. Bob Chen and Katy Irwin learned that a physician from a low-income country who had been accepted to the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) was at risk of losing her financial support for this two-year program in applied public health and epidemiology. Because the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) was not authorized at the time to provide financial assistance to foreign nationals for this applied public health training, the two young physicians decided to address this gap by establishing the Atlanta International Health Fellowship (AIHF).

With help from other EIS Officers, employees and retirees of CDC and Emory University employees and Atlanta residents, they raised funds and formed partnerships with Emory University, CDC and Villa International Atlanta for tuition and lodging support, respectively.

Since the first fellowships were awarded in 1991, over 60 individuals from over 34 countries have received stipends to help cover some of their costs (e.g., tuition, lodging, medical insurance and/or transportation) to complete applied public health courses sponsored by CDC or Emory University.

Today, funds are awarded for both remote online and in-person course formats and the AIHF collaborates with other international fellowship programs, such as the Hubert H. Humphrey Fellowship. In 1997, the Tull Charitable Foundation made a major grant to enable the AIHF to become the first endowed fund at the CDC Foundation.

For further information, please contact Susanne Salehi at ssalehi@cdcfoundation.org or via phone at 901.907.4224.