| David Michaels | |
| Office: | Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health |
| President: | Barack Obama |
| Term Start: | December 8, 2009 |
| Term End: | January 10, 2017 |
| Predecessor: | Edwin Foulke Jordan Barab (acting) |
| Successor: | Loren Sweatt (acting) Douglas L. Parker |
| Birth Place: | New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Education: | City College of New York (BA) Columbia University (MPH, PhD) |
David Michaels is an American epidemiologist and professor in the Departments of Environmental and Occupational Health and Epidemiology at the Milken Institute School of Public Health of the George Washington University. He held high-level, senate-confirmed public health positions in the administrations of Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, including a stint from 2009 to 2017 as the administrator of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
Michaels graduated from the City College of New York, and holds a Master in Public Health (MPH) and a PhD from Columbia University. Before joining the faculty of the George Washington University, he taught at the CUNY School of Medicine and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
Michaels served as the United States Department of Energy's Assistant Secretary for Environment, Safety, and Health from 1998 through January 2001. In this position, he had primary responsibility for protecting the health and safety of workers, the neighboring communities and the environment surrounding the nation's nuclear weapons facilities. Michaels developed the initiative to compensate workers in the nuclear weapons complex who developed cancer or lung disease as a result of exposure to radiation, beryllium, silica, or other hazards. That initiative resulted in the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program, which has provided over $24 billion in benefits to sick workers and the families of deceased workers since its inception in 2001.
During the HIV/AIDS epidemic, Michaels developed a widely used mathematical model to estimate the number of children orphaned by the disease.[1] In addition, while employed at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, NY, he helped found and directed the Epidemiology Unit at the Montefiore-Rikers Island Health Service, the first such unit at a jail in the United States.
From 2009 to January 2017, Michaels served as the Assistant Secretary of Labor for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Nominated by President Barack Obama and unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Michaels served as OSHA's 12th Assistant Secretary, the longest serving administrator in OSHA's history.
As Assistant Secretary, Michaels issued new health standards protecting workers exposed to silica and beryllium, strengthened the agency's enforcement in high risk industries, expanded OSHA's whistleblower protection program, promoted common sense worker protection programs and standards, increased compliance assistance provided to small employers, and focused outreach on the vulnerable populations who are at greatest risk for work-related injury and illness. He also increased OSHA's capabilities in the areas of data analysis and program evaluation.
Michaels served as Chair of the Executive Committee of the US National Toxicology Program (NTP) from 2011 to 2017, and was a member of the NTP's Board of Scientific Counselors 2018-2022.
Much of Michaels' recent work has focused on protecting workers from exposure to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. He served on the Biden-Harris Transition COVID-19 Advisory Board and The Lancet COVID-19 Commission Task Force on Safe Work, Safe School, and Safe Travel.