George Annas

George Annas is the William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Department of Health Law, Bioethics & Human Rights at Boston University School of Public Health. In addition, he is also Professor at the Boston University School of Medicine and School of Law. He is the co-founder of Global Lawyers and Physicians, a transnational professional association of lawyers and physicians working together to promote human rights and health. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a member of the Institute of Medicine, vice-chair of the American Bar Association’s Committee on Health Rights and Bioethics (Individual Rights and Responsibilities Section), and a member of the Committee on Human Rights of the National Academy of Sciences. He has also held a variety of government regulatory posts, including Vice Chair of the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine, Chair of the Massachusetts Health Facilities Appeals Board, and Chair of the Massachusetts Organ Transplant Task Force. Annas is the author or editor of nineteen books on health law and bioethics, including Worst Case Bioethics: Death, Disaster, and Public Health, American Bioethics: Crossing Human Rights and Health Law Boundaries, and The Rights of Patients. In addition, he has written regular features for both the Hastings Center Report and the American Journal of Public Health, and is currently writing a regular feature for the New England Journal of Medicine. Annas has been called “the father of patient rights,” “the doyen of American medico-legal analysts,” and a “national treasure.” After graduating from law school, he clerked for Justice John V. Spalding of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, and then moved to Boston to become Director of the Center for Law and Health Sciences at Boston University School of Law. He earned an AB in economics from Harvard University, a JD from Harvard Law School, and an MPH from the Harvard School of Public Health, where he was a Joseph P. Kennedy Fellow in Medical Ethics.