Dr. Vicente Y. Belizario, Jr., former Vice Chancellor for Research and NIH Executive Director, is the newest Undersecretary of the Department of Health. He took his oath of office before Secretary Janette L. Garin on 2 March 2015. Usec. Belizario now heads the Office for Technical Services which includes the following bureaus: Epidemiology; Disease Prevention and Control; Health Emergency Management; Health Facility Development; Health Promotion and Communication Service; Philippine National AIDS Council, National Nutrition Council; and, the Population Commission.
As a DOH Undersecretary, Dr. Belizario sees his work as, mainly, to oversee the provision of public health services and to support President Benigno S. Aquino III’s Health Agenda focused on Universal Health Care. When asked if he also plans to continue his more than a decade-long campaign for more effective control of Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) like soil-transmitted helminthiasis and schistosomiasis, Usec. Belizario answered, “It is time to make the ‘War on Worms’ truly a nationwide campaign.”
Dr. Belizario is on secondment from the College of Public Health where he is a full-time professor at the Department of Parasitology. However, he retains his other positions: Adjunct Faculty, Global Health Program, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine; Member, Soil-transmitted Helminthiasis Advisory Committee, Task Force for Global Health/Children Without Worms, USA; Member and Country Representative, Steering Committee, Forum for Ethics Review Committees in Asia and the Western Pacific (FERCAP); and, Member, Editorial Board, Acta Medica Philippina.
Dr. Belizario graduated from the College of Medicine in 1985. He earned his Master of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (MTM&H) at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland, USA. Under WHO, he also did his Fellowship at the Laboratory for Parasitic Diseases at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia.
A prolific writer-researcher, he authored/co-authored over 70 scientific publications on malaria, neglected tropical and parasitic diseases in peer-reviewed local and international journals. He is the editor, as well as one of the contributors, of the best-selling “Philippine Textbook of Medical Parasitology” (which is now on its 3rd edition as “Medical Parasitology in the Philippines”).
Dr. Belizario has received multiple awards for his work as a teacher and researcher, some of which are: Outstanding Research in Tropical Medicine Award from the National Academy of Science and Technology-Philippines (NAST) in 2013; three Outstanding Health Research Awards from the NAST and the Department of Science and Technology-Philippine Council for Health Research and Development (the most recent being in 2014); Rank of University Scientist I, III, III of the UP System (2006-08, 2009-11, 2012-present); NAST Outstanding Young Scientist Award for Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (1999); Outstanding Researcher Award, UP Medical Alumni Society (2010); two Outstanding Teacher Awards (for the Basic Medical Sciences) from the UP College of Medicine and UP Medical Alumni Society in America (1997, 2005); and, NAST Outstanding Book Award for the “Philippine Textbook of Medical Parasitology” (2000).
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Written: Fedelynn M. Jemena/IPPAO-UPM
Photo: DOH Media Relations Unit
