Friends of IARC

"Health is a human right."

Sir Michael Marmot has led research groups on health inequalities for more than 35 years. He chaired the Commission on Social Determinants of Health, which was set up by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2005, and produced the report Closing the Gap in a Generation in 2008. He conducted a Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England Post-2010, which published the report Fair Society, Healthy Lives in 2010. He chaired the Review of Social Determinants of Health and the Health Divide in the WHO European Region, and the Breast Screening Review for the NHS National Cancer Action Team, and was a member of The Lancet–University of Oslo Commission on Global Governance for Health. He is a principal investigator of the Whitehall II studies of health inequalities among British civil servants, and was a founder of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing. Sir Michael is currently the Director of the University College London Institute of Health Equity. 

Sir Michael is a former president of the British Medical Association and the World Medical Association. He was a member of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution for six years, and in 2000 was knighted by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, for his services to epidemiology and the understanding of health inequalities. He won the Balzan Prize for Epidemiology in 2004, gave the Harveian Oration in 2006, and won the William B. Graham Prize for Health Services Research in 2008. He was awarded a Harvard Lown Professorship for 2014–2017. He has been awarded honorary doctorates from 18 universities. Sir Michael was awarded the IARC Medal of Honour in 2014.