Jonathan Elliot Cohen, JD, Mphil

Jonathan E. Cohen, JD MPhil (he/him/his) is Professor of Clinical Population and Public Health Sciences at the University of Southern California and Director of Policy Engagement at the USC Institute on Inequalities in Global Health. His work seeks to address the broad social inequalities that shape health outcomes worldwide, with particular attention to sexual and reproductive health, healthy longevity, and the health effects of climate change. An emerging leader in the field of population aging, Professor Cohen served as a visiting scholar studying LGBTQ+ aging at the Hastings Center and as a Health and Aging Policy Fellow in the United States Senate in 2023. He currently represents the Keck School of Medicine and the Institute on Inequalities in Global Health on USC’s new Capital Campus, a coast-to-coast bridge between interdisciplinary scholarship and policy making in Washington, DC.

Prior to joining USC, Professor Cohen directed the Public Health Program at the Open Society Foundations, overseeing one of the world’s largest philanthropic enterprises to advance human rights in global health. In that role, he oversaw a budget of $40 million and a global staff of 75 people working to advance access to medicines, ethnicity and health equality, harm reduction, HIV/AIDS treatment and care, sexual and reproductive health, and other core aspects of the human right to health. He also led Open Society’s leadership group advancing diversity, equity and inclusion. At USC, he created and co-leads Continuous Learning for Antiracist Culture Change, a fellowship program that equips faculty and staff to widen the circle of power and opportunity in public health education.

Professor Cohen began his career as a law clerk at the Supreme Court of Canada and as a researcher with the HIV/AIDS Program at Human Rights Watch. A citizen of both Canada and the United States, he holds degrees from Yale College, the University of Cambridge, and the University of Toronto Faculty of Law.