Biography
Lecturer and Social Impact Fellow at UC Berkeley School of Public Health
Dr. Anthony Iton, MD, JD, MPH, is a Lecturer and Social Impact Fellow at The University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health. For 15 years, he served as the Senior Vice President for Healthy Communities at The California Endowment, a private statewide health foundation whose mission is to expand access for affordable, quality healthcare for underserved individuals and communities, and to promote fundamental health improvements for all Californians. Prior to that, Dr. Iton served for seven years as the Alameda County Public Health Department Director and Health Officer, where he oversaw public health practice focused on preventing communicable disease outbreaks, reducing the burden of chronic disease and obesity, and managing the county’s preparedness for biological terrorism.
Q&A
What inspires you in your work?
I am passionate about the need to eliminate health inequities; that goal has been a constant throughout my career. I believe the only way to achieve sustainable progress is by designing intensive, place-conscious interventions that draw on existing assets and build social, political, and economic power among residents of under-resourced communities.
If you could change one thing about medical education, what would it be?
I would help medical students gain deeper insight into their patients’ lives by participating in patient home visits and ambulance ride-alongs. Once students had participated in 50 home visits and ambulance rides, I’d ask them to write assessments of the social conditions their patients face and the policies they see as barriers to their patients’ health and opportunity.
What life experience has taught or changed you the most?
My older brother died from leukemia at the age of 51. It was a shock to our family, and we are changed as a result. I have learned not to take things for granted and that humans are fragile and ultimately mortal. It also taught me to question conventional wisdom and to pursue fundamental change with an urgency that’s tempered by realism.
What’s your most annoying habit?
I am impatient and sometimes I reveal my impatience at times when I should probably disguise it.
