Francesco Forastiere

Francesco Forastiere, MD, PhD, is an environmental epidemiologist who currently serves as a visiting professor at Imperial College, London, in the Environmental Research Group. He has worked as a public health officer for almost four decades in the Department of Epidemiology, Lazio Region Health Service, Rome, dealing with environmental and occupational exposures and their impacts on health. With a medical background in respiratory and occupational medicine, a Master of Science in Epidemiology from LSHTM, London, and a PhD in Epidemiology from the University of Linkoping, Sweden, he has studied the health effects of numerous environmental and occupational exposures. He has been the principal investigator in several EC-funded projects since the Fourth Framework Programme up to the most recent Horizon initiatives. Francesco Forastiere has authored or co-authored over 600 full papers in peer-reviewed scientific literature. He has served as a temporary adviser for WHO/Geneva/Bonn on several occasions and has contributed to the WHO Air Quality Guidelines in 2005 and the updates published in September 2021. He has also been a member of three working groups in Lyon at IARC for the evaluation of some chemicals (vol. 54, 1992), air pollution (Vol. 109, 2013), and some organophosphate insecticides and herbicides (Vol.112, 2015). In addition, he has worked as a consultant for the Health Effects Institute in the USA, performing a systematic review of the health effects of traffic-related air pollution published in 2022. He is the Chief Editor of the Italian Journal of Epidemiology (Epidemiologia & Prevenzione) and an Associate Editor of Environmental Health. He has focused on applying innovative scientific research methods, including health impact assessment, to address various public health issues such as air pollution, radon, waste disposal, occupational exposure to silica and asbestos, environmental tobacco smoke, and Covid-19. Several organizations have recognized his expertise in air quality and health. In recognition of his sustained and outstanding contributions to the knowledge and practice of environmental epidemiology, he was awarded the \"John Goldsmith Award\" by the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology (ISEE) in 2022 and by the “Chair ERS Award” from the European Respiratory Society (ERS) in 2023.