He is the director of the UnitedHealth Chronic Disease Initiative at Emory University (which grew out of the UnitedHealth “Ovations initiative”),[1] which together with the US National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute has created 11 centres in low and middle income countries that work on non-communicable disease.
[2] Smith also serves as chair of the Cochrane Library Oversight Committee and a member of the UK Panel on Research Integrity.
He sits on the board of directors of the Public Library of Science,[3] an open access publisher of scientific and medical research.
[5] He has published in dozens of medical journals, written widely in the lay press and currently blogs regularly for the BMJ.
[citation needed] In December 2014, Smith wrote on the BMJ blog that trying to find a cure for cancer was a waste of money, claiming that, "with love, morphine, and whisky", the disease is the best way to die.