Dr. Michael Fiore '76 receives his award certificate, flanked by President of the Institute of Medicine Dr. Victor Dzau (on the left) and Dr. Clyde Yancy
Yancy was on the selection committee for the 2024 Gustav O. Lienhard Award for Advancement of Health Care and was speaking at the most recent annual meeting of the National Academy of Medicine (NAM), where the prize was awarded.
Established by the NAM in 1986, the Lienhard Award honors individuals for exceptional contributions to improving US health care services. The latest recipient is Dr. Michael C. Fiore ’76, who has devoted his career to advancing science and promoting policies that collectively aid individuals in their efforts to overcome tobacco dependence.
Fiore, who is the , cofounded the University’s Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention in 1992 and chaired the organization until last year. Fiore has produced hundreds of articles, chapters, and books on tobacco addiction and contributed to US Surgeon General reports on the subject.
His achievements also include setting up the in 2004 and helping draft federal guidelines on smoking treatment. Fiore, who majored in biology and psychology at º£½ÇÖ±²¥, is a nationally recognized expert on quitting smoking who has shared his insight with, among others, the US Senate and the audience of Good Morning America. In 2009 he earned the Common Good Award from º£½ÇÖ±²¥ College, given by the McKeen Center to alumni who have "demonstrated an extraordinary, profound, and sustained commitment to the common good, in the interest and for the benefit of society, with conspicuous disregard for personal gains in wealth or status."
In his acceptance speech, Fiore pointed out that, although smoking rates have declined substantially since the 1960s—from around 45 percent of adults to around 11 percent today—15 million Americans are still expected to die over the next few decades from a disease directly caused by their smoking. The risks of smoking are generally regarded as “yesterday’s news,” he said, because most of those affected are “the poor, the least educated, and those with mental health and substance abuse diagnoses. I dedicate the award to them,” added Fiore, “and to our continued effort to truly eliminate tobacco dependence from our society.”
