Allan Rosenfield

Allan Rosenfield (April 28, 1933 – October 12, 2008) was an advocate for women's health during the worldwide AIDS pandemic as dean of the Columbia Mailman School of Public Health.

Early life Rosenfield was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, on April 28, 1933. He received a B.A. in biochemistry from Harvard College in 1955. In 1959, he graduated from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons with his M.D. degree.

Career After receiving his medical degree, he worked in Thailand with the Population Council in the 1960s, in a country with a severe lack of physicians and a 3.3% annual population growth rate, providing advice to the ministry of public health on reproductive, maternal and child health issues. In the six years he spent in Thailand, he started a family and learned the Thai language. At the time, IUDs and birth control pills were only available by prescription from a doctor. This meant that the most effective types of birth control were not available to 99% of the Thailand population. The national family planning program Rosenfield helped develop trained auxiliary midwives to prescribe birth control. Thailand's annual population growth rate dropped to 0.8% by the year 2000.

Rosenfield died of ALS at age 75 on October 12, 2008 at his home in Hartsdale, New York. He was survived by his daughter, his son, and his wife, Clare.