University of Minnesota School of Public Health

In 2023, it ranked as the: The school offers a BA in Public Health and many first-rate programs leading to MPH, MHA, MS, PhD, dual degrees, and degrees for working professionals, as well as certificates and postdoctoral training in various areas of public health.

In 1937, noted physiologist Ancel Keys founded the Laboratory of Physiological Hygiene in the Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health.

Project EAT has since become the largest, most comprehensive longitudinal body of research to examine a broad array of weight-related outcomes from adolescence through adulthood.

The school has directed some of the most significant studies of heart-attack risk factors and prevention, with the first being the Seven Countries Study (1967–1978) whose findings disproved the notion that cardiovascular disease was a natural element of aging and is, instead, linked to lifestyle and diet, particularly a diet high in animal fat.

The Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial (MRFIT), for example, which ran from 1973 to 1982, tested whether lowering elevated serum cholesterol and diastolic blood pressure and ceasing cigarette smoking would reduce coronary heart disease mortality.

Two CCBR trials in the early 2000s, SMART and START, focused on when to administer antiretroviral treatment for HIV and changed  protocols around the world.

Professor Leonard Schuman played a key role in drafting the 1964 Surgeon General’s Report definitively linking smoking to cancer.

In the decades to follow, SPH research played a role in the 1990 first-of-its-kind legislation that banned cigarette vending machines in public places, discovered that smoking leaves an epigenetic “shadow” on our genes no matter when we quit, identified the risk of having an abdominal aortic aneurysm drops when smokers quit, and found that a cancer-causing chemical forms in the bodies of people who vape, research that influenced legislation on flavored vaping liquid.

The work resulted in Minnesota legislation that allows Medicaid payment for services from a certified doula for pregnant people.

Our research has led to (among many innovations): The deans of the UMN School of Public Health are: Lehmberg, Stanford E. and Pflaum, Ann.