Aileen Maria Marty is an infectious disease expert and a Distinguished University professor at the FIU Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine. [1] [2]
Aileen Maria Marty is an infectious disease expert and a Distinguished University professor at the FIU Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine. [1] [2]
Born in Havana, Cuba, [3] her family left Cuba following the Cuban Revolution of 1959. Her family first moved to Caracas Venezuela and then to the United States. [4]
She served as a distinguished Naval Officer in the US Navy for 25 years. In 1982, while in the Navy, she graduated from the University of Miami School of Medicine. [5] [4] She was appointed to the Homeland Defense Committee in 2001 by Admiral James A. Zimble. [6] She continued to serve in the US Navy in joint missions long after her retirement from the Navy, [1] in 2003. [4]
Marty is a distinguished physician, infectious disease expert, and retired U.S. Navy officer with over 45 years of clinical and research experience. She graduated from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and served 25 years in the Navy, specializing in tropical medicine, infectious diseases, and disaster response.
Her career includes significant roles such as a UN weapons inspector, advisor to the World Health Organization, and consultant on global outbreaks like Ebola, Zika, and COVID-19. Marty also co-developed the Military Tropical Medicine course and helped establish the FIU-FAST team for disaster medical response. Currently, she is a Distinguished University Professor at Florida International University’s Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine.
Marty is widely recognized for her expertise in public health policy, emerging infectious diseases, and medical countermeasures. She frequently advises governments and organizations worldwide on outbreak response and emergency preparedness. Marty has worked on outbreak response, including Zika fever in Miami, [7] Ebola, [8] COVID-19, [9] [10] [11] and Mpox. [12]
While in the Navy, she developed excercise and training programs for the US Government including members of the Department of State, Centers for Disease Control, the Joint Military Intelligence College, Naval War College, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, and Food and Drug Administration, among others [13] and She worked on Anthrax cases of patients during the 2001 Anthrax letters, being of special help to the family of the first case to present at what was then Ceders of Lebanon Hospital in Miami. [6] She also studied old cases of anthrax at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology and USAMRIID. [6] Marty has conducted life-saving research and helped produce programs that have saved lives. She has headed World Health Organization teams in outbreak response and mass gatherings and produced interim guidance documents for the World Health Organization. [14] As of 2022, Marty was co-editor-in-chief of the journal One Health. [15] [16]
In 2003, her 16-year-old only son was killed as a passenger in a vehicle driven into a tree by another teenage boy. [17] Another unfortunate event happened in the 2012, when Marty was asked to join the board of World Patent Marketing. Unbeknownst to her, the company did not pay their inventors. Marty had been lied to and told that she would be sent patent ideas to review. She never received any and returned the small check she had received when she heard the company might be committing fraud. She commented, "I wish I had never heard of the company and I wish that my name were not in any way associated with it. I can't turn back time and not accept the offer to be on their board — believe me if I could, I would". [18]
In 2015, the Miami-Dade Parks and Recreation department honored Marty for her work on Ebola, malaria, and other diseases. [5] In September 2021, singer Gloria Estefan nominated Marty for Good Morning America 's "Inspiration List". [19]