Thomas A. Burke

WARNING! Sewage sludge is toxic. Food should not be grown in "biosolids." Join the Food Rights Network.

Thomas A. Burke "is professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health, with joint appointments in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences and the School of Medicine’s Department of Oncology. He is also founding codirector of the university’s Risk Sciences and Public Policy Institute. Before joining the university, Dr. Burke was deputy commissioner of health for the State of New Jersey and director of science and research for the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. In New Jersey, he directed pioneering initiatives that influenced the development of national programs, such as Superfund, the Safe Drinking Water Act, and the Toxics Release Inventory. His research interests include environmental epidemiology, the evaluation of community exposures to environmental pollutants, the assessment and communication of environmental risks, and the application of epidemiology and health risk assessment to public policy. Dr. Burke is chair of the advisory board to the directors of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Environmental Health, and is a member of the National Research Council (NRC) Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology. He received his Ph.D. in epidemiology from the University of Pennsylvania and his M.P.H. from the University of Texas."

Burke chaired the National Research Council's Committee on Toxicants and Pathogens in Biosolids Applied to Land which authored a 2002 report titled "Biosolids Applied to Land: Advancing Standards and Practices."