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Michelle Morse, MD, MPH, is the chief medical officer for the New York City Department of Health, the oldest and largest municipal health department in the United States. Under her tenure as acting commissioner from October 2024 to February 2026, New York City achieved historic gains in life expectancy, reductions in overdose deaths, and investments that prioritize equitable health outcomes.
In 2021, Dr. Morse joined the NYC Health Department as the inaugural chief medical officer and deputy commissioner for the Center for Health Equity and Community Wellness. She launched the NYC Public Health Corps, a $100 million investment across more than 100 community-based organizations to partner with communities unfairly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. During her tenure, she also established the Coalition to End Racism in Clinical Algorithms (CERCA), the City’s first ever Office of Healthcare Accountability and opened the first Neighborhood Stress-Free Zone in New York City to improve maternal health in Brownsville, Brooklyn, a neighborhood with the highest pregnancy-associated mortality rate in New York City.
Previously, Dr. Morse served as the deputy chief medical officer for Partners In Health. In 2013, she led the opening of a 300-bed teaching hospital and its first three residency programs in rural Haiti. In 2015 she helped establish the University of Global Health Equity in Rwanda. Inspired by her time in Haiti, she co-founded EqualHealth, an international organization dedicated to social medicine.
Dr. Morse is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Harvard School of Public Health, and the University of Virginia. She completed an internal medicine residency at Harvard Medical School’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital and was a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellow with the Ways and Means Committee in the U.S. House of Representatives. Dr. Morse was honored in New York Magazine’s Most Influential New Yorkers list, as a TIME100 Next honoree, and as CUNY’s 2025 Champion of Public Health.
She currently practices medicine as a part-time hospitalist at Kings County Hospital. Dr. Morse serves on the board of EqualHealth, and is the vice-chair of the board of Partners In Health.
June 2026
