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The Harvard School of Public Health appointed Mary B. Rice, a pulmonary and critical care physician and associate professor at Harvard Medical School, as the next director of its Center for Climate, Health, and the Global Environment. She will lead C-CHANGE starting Oct. 1.

As a physician at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and professor at HMS, Rice specializes on the impacts of climate pollutants on respiratory health and says she hopes to bring her experience working in the academic, research, and professional worlds to C-CHANGE.

“I’m really going to prioritize solutions-oriented research and cross disciplinary research, bringing all the right experts together,” Rice said.

Rice said she hopes to foster more connections among scientists, bridging gaps between the behavioral sciences, natural sciences, and economics.

“What I’m hoping to do is have a very large number of faculty across the medical campus affiliated with C-CHANGE as investigators,” she said.

Rice said she hopes research findings will inform climate policy and patient care.

“It’s pretty clear now that there are health effects of fossil fuel pollution and climate change, but that information on its own doesn’t necessarily tell patients and policymakers what to do about it,” she said. “Those are the kind of questions that I’m hoping that C-CHANGE can help address.”

“If you make the health costs translate directly into metrics that policymakers use, it can have a much more direct impact on policy,” Rice said.

In addition to new research, Rice said she also will prioritize improving educational resources and collaboration across Harvard’s schools.

“What I plan to prioritize as director of the Center is engaging students and trainees through formal climate change and health education at the Harvard Chan School,” she said, which includes supporting HMS and nearby hospitals.

While taking on her new role, Rice will continue practicing medicine and conducting research, endeavors she described as “synergistic.”

“It is very important to me as a clinician-scientist to continue to be an investigator,” Rice said. “But as a director, I hope to engage others with a variety of disciplines, to spur new collaborations.”

—Staff writer Xinni (Sunshine) Chen can be reached at sunshine.chen@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @sunshine_cxn.

—Staff writer Christie E. Beckley can be reached at christie.beckley@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @cbeckley22.