UCLA Fielding School of Public Health epidemiology professor honored with Harvard “Alumni Award of Merit”

A professor at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health has been honored for his work leading research and education efforts to promote inclusive health among sexual and gender minorities and marginalized communities worldwide.

Dr. Matthew Mimiaga, professor in the UCLA Fielding Department of Epidemiology, was recognized in September with The Alumni Award of Merit - the highest honor presented by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Alumni Association - which recognizes alumni whose careers reflect a lifetime of impact, organizers said.

“One of the things that I really learned from attending Harvard was that community is so important in the work that we do,” said Mimiaga, who earned his doctoral degree at Harvard Chan in 2007. “Very much like at UCLA, people who attend Harvard want to change the world, and make it a better place and it does change you … my experience changed me deeply, and I am extremely thankful.”

Mimiaga, founding director of the UCLA Center for LGBTQ+ Advocacy, Research & Health (C-LARAH), has dedicated his career to advancing the health and well-being of sexual and gender minorities and other marginalized populations, said Dr. Margie Skeer, professor and chair of public health and community medicine at the Tufts University School of Medicine who nominated Mimiaga for the award.

““He is unlike anybody I've ever met in this work; he is incredibly prolific, cares so much about what he's doing, and is clearly dedicated to improving the lives he seeks to impact,” Skeer said. “When he graduated, he just set the world ablaze with his work in HIV and hasn't stopped since.”

Along with his appointment at UCLA Fielding, Mimiaga serves as vice chair of the UCLA Fielding epidemiology department, and as professor of psychiatry & biobehavioral sciences at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. He previously held faculty positions at Harvard and Brown and continues to serve as an adjunct professor at Brown, as well as an affiliated senior research scientist at The Fenway Institute, Fenway Health, Boston.

Mimiaga has authored more than 420 peer-reviewed scientific journal articles and book chapters; led studies in numerous countries; and, along with Dr. Roger Detels, distinguished professor also in the UCLA Fielding Department of Epidemiology, is the principal investigator of the Los Angeles clinical research site for the MACS/WIHS Combined Cohort Study (MWCCS), the longest running cohort study aimed at understanding and reducing the impact of chronic and other health conditions that affect people living with and without HIV.

“One thing that I really am proud of is starting the Center for LGBTQ+ Advocacy, Research and Health at UCLA; I started it from the ground up with a group of dedicated students, staff and faculty,” Mimiaga said. “Through being successful with grant funding and philanthropic support, I was able to grow the center over the past five years and it's now what I would consider one of the top, leading centers for LGBTQ+ health research in the United States.”