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1991.03.28 :  Appointment of George Bowen 

Contact: Sue Bernstein (301) 443 -3377
March 28, 1991

       Robert G. Harmon, M.D., M.P.H., administrator of the Health
Resources and Services Administration of the Public Health Service,
today announced the appointment of George Stephen Bowen, M.D., as
director of the agency's Bureau of Health Resources
Development.   
       "Dr. Bowen brings an ideal mixture of scientific expertise
and social concern to a bureau that implements many of our national
AIDS care programs, and also promotes organ transplantation," said
Dr. Harmon.  "His years of experience in epidemiology and his
longtime involvement with prevention programs at the local and
state level offer us the broadest commitment possible to some of
our most pressing national health problems." 
       Under the recently enacted Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS
Resources Emergency Act, the Bureau of Health Resources Development
is responsible for the major portion of two new HIV-related grant
programs:  Title I, to help heavily affected metropolitan areas
provide outpatient care and ambulatory health support to low income
HIV infected individuals; and Title II, to help states improve a
range of services to individuals and families with HIV infection. 
Fiscal 1991 funding for Titles I and II in HRSA totals $176
million, with the bureau responsible for administering $167 million
of those funds.

       In addition to administering several AIDS programs, the
bureau awards and administers a program of grants to support and
promote organ transplantation, and monitors the obligation of
health care facilities to serve needy persons in return for Hill-
Burton construction grants and loans. 

       Dr. Bowen joined HRSA in September 1990 as director of the
Division of HIV Services following 19 years of service with the
Centers for Disease Control as an epidemiologist and researcher on
infectious disease programs.   

       From  May 1987 until September 1990,  Dr. Bowen was deputy
director (HIV) of the CDC's Center for Prevention Services and was
responsible for coordinating prevention programs for education and
risk reduction through direct funding to 93 national, regional and
local community organizations and 63 state and local health
departments.  In this liaison capacity, Dr. Bowen pioneered, with
HRSA officials, a pilot project to combine HIV-related health care
with programs of prevention.        
                                                                  
       A California native, Dr. Bowen received his medical degree
from the University of California at Los Angeles School of Medicine
in 1968.  He earned a master's degree in public health in 1971; and
in 1983, he received board certification in preventive medicine and
public health.

       Dr. Bowen has contributed extensively to the scientific
literature on arthropod-borne viruses and on Lyme disease.  He has
also written and spoken extensively about HIV prevention and the
need to link prevention to HIV care programs.  


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