Dr. Frank is currently a Senior Fellow and Director of the Center on Health Policy at the Brookings Institution and Professor Emeritus at Harvard University. Until September 2021, he was the Margaret T. Morris Professor of Health Economics at Harvard University Medical School. He taught in Harvard’s university-wide doctoral program in health policy and at the Harvard Kennedy School. Dr. Frank is also a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. Since 1981, he has been engaged in research and teaching in health economics. He has lectured and published papers on the economics and regulation of the pharmaceutical industry as well as other facets of the healthcare sector.
From 2009 to 2011, Dr. Frank served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for planning and evaluation at Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) directing the Office of Disability, Aging and Long[1]Term Care Policy. From 2013 to 2014, He served as a Special Advisor to the Office of the Secretary at DHHS, and from 2014 to 2016, he served as Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation in DHHS. In his roles at DHHS, he led policy work on implementing regulations for the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act. He also served as the co-coordinator of the Secretary of DHHS’s opioid initiative. Those roles both required service on government-wide coordinating committees that included both the Office of Personnel Management and the Defense Department’s TRICARE program.
His research is focused on the economics of mental health and substance abuse care, long term care financing policy, health care competition, implementation of health reform and disability policy. His work in the area of pharmaceuticals has focused on drug pricing and the dynamics of competition; as well as the impact of prescription drug formularies and direct to consumer advertising of drugs and the impact of pharmaceutical innovation on treatment patterns and cost.
Ph.D., Economics, Boston University; B.A., Economics, Bard College.
Telephone: 617.871.6900
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