Howard Frumkin is head of the Our Plant, Our Health initiative at the Wellcome Trust. A physician and epidemiologist, his research interests include health aspects of the built environment, climate change, energy policy, nature contact, and sustainability. Dr. Frumkin was previously Professor of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences at the University of Washington School of Public Health, where he served as Dean from 2010-2016. From 2005 to 2010 he held leadership roles at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, first as director of the National Center for Environmental Health and Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (NCEH/ATSDR), and later as Special Assistant to the CDC Director for Climate Change and Health. During his tenure NCEH/ATSDR created programs in Climate Change and in Healthy Community Design; launched training programs for college students, doctoral students, and post-docs; expanded its Biomonitoring and Environmental Public Health Tracking programs; and launched its National Conversation on Public Health and Chemical Exposures.

From 1990 to 2005, he was Professor and Chair of Environmental and Occupational Health at Emory University's Rollins School of Public Health and Professor of Medicine at Emory Medical School. Dr. Frumkin has served on the Boards of the Bullitt Foundation and the Seattle Parks Foundation, on the NASEM Committee on Measuring Community Resilience, on the Steering Committee of the Planetary Health Alliance (Harvard University), and on advisory committees to the Global Consortium on Climate and Health Education (Columbia University), the Medical Society Consortium on Climate & Health (George Mason University), and the Canadian Urban Environmental Health Research Consortium (University of Toronto). In past years he served on the Boards of the US Green Building Council, Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR), the Children and Nature Network (including a term as Chair), the Pacific Northwest Diabetes Research Institute, the National Environmental Education Foundation, the American Public Health Association (as Chair of APHA's Science Board), the Association of Occupational and Environmental Clinics (AOEC) (including a term as President), and the Washington Global Health Alliance. He is the author, co-author, or editor of over 200 scientific journal articles, chapters, and books, including the standard environmental health textbook, Environmental Health: From Global to Local. Dr. Frumkin is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians, the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Collegium Ramazzini and the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland, and a member of the Washington State Academy of Sciences. He loves cycling, kayaking, and hiking.

He is married to radio journalist Joanne Silberner, and has two children.