James A. Merchant, M.D., Dr. P.H.
Presentation Topic: Rural Iowa Air Quality
Dr. Merchant, currently a professor of environmental health and pulmonary medicine at the University of Iowa, served as the first dean of the College of Public Health at the University of Iowa, from 1999 to 2008. He is a nationally known expert on occupational and environmental health, rural health, and public health policy.
The impacts on the health of those living near industrial farm animal production facilities have increasingly been the subject of research. Dr. Merchant will share research findings regarding fine particle pollution from agriculture, rural asthma, and the relationship between confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and health effects. Rural air pollution in the form of greenhouse gases, methane and certain odor and other emissions are also a part of his topic.
Dr. Merchant, who served as a Pew Commissioner for a 2-year study of Industrial Farm Animal Production, will share the consensus recommendations of the Commission. This was a project of the Pew Charitable Trusts and John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, which resulted in the 2008 report entitled: Putting Meat on the Table: Industrial Farm Animal Production in America.
A native of Ames, Iowa, Dr. Merchant received a bachelor’s degree in bacteriology from Iowa State University in 1962 and an M.D. degree from the University of Iowa in 1966. He completed an internship and an internal medicine residency at Cleveland Metropolitan General Hospital, followed by a fellowship in pulmonary and environmental medicine at Duke University. In 1973, he received a doctorate in public health in epidemiology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Prior to being named Dean, Dr. Merchant served as head of the UI College of Medicine’s Department of Preventive Medicine and Environmental Health from 1997 to 1999, directed the department’s Division of Occupational and Environmental Health from 1983-1997, and taught in the department since 1981. He directed two programs for the Centers for Disease Control’s National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health before returning to Iowa in 1981.
Dr. Merchant has been the principal investigator on many research grants funded by federal agencies, private foundations, and corporations, and he has been honored with numerous awards, including a commendation medal from the US Public Health Service and a Health Policy Fellowship with the United States Senate. In 1999, he was elected to the Institute of Medicine. Presently, he is the Director of the Healthier Workforce Center for Excellence.
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