Professor Jonathan Van-Tam is an academic with a specialist interest in emergency medicine who became known to the wider public during the COVID-19 pandemic as Deputy Chief Medical Officer issuing guidance from the podium at No 10 Downing Street
Professor Jonathan Van-Tam Kt, MBE, FMedSci, is a doctor and public health specialist with a clinical background in emergency medicine, anaesthesia and infectious diseases; an academic expert on respiratory viruses and pandemics. His career has also taken him to Public Health England, the World Health Organization, and the pharmaceutical and vaccine industries.
He has published over 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers.
Jonathan was seconded to the Department of Health and Social Care in 2017-22 as Deputy Chief Medical Officer.
He is well-known for his leadership role during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly his unique, no-nonsense, communication style from the podium at No.10 Downing Street, his colourful analogies – often football related, and for the acquisition and rollout of vaccines and antiviral drugs in the UK.
He received a knighthood from Her late Majesty the Queen in 2022, for services to public health. Alongside numerous other eponymous lectures, he was awarded the Royal Society’s Attenborough Award and Lecture 2022, for outstanding public engagement in science.
Jonathan’s background is unusual, and his life journey is fascinating, hailing from mixed British-Vietnamese heritage and what he would describe as a very ordinary upbringing in South Lincolnshire.
He is Chair of the Lincolnshire FA so football is a passion which he often uses in his after dinner speeches; the accent being on wry anecdotal observations.