Abdul El-Sayed: Who is America’s first epidemiologist senator?

AI Summary

Abdul El-Sayed is described as the first Muslim and first epidemiologist elected to the US Senate. Born in Michigan to Egyptian parents, he studied at Oxford and Columbia and researched public health issues including poverty, obesity, and infant mortality.

“As an Arab-American, the likelihood of ever having the opportunity to vote for an Arab-American candidate for national office during my lifetime is minimal.” Those are the words written by medical student Abdul El-Sayed, then a student at the University of Oxford, in the Guardian in 2010.1Little did he know that, 16 years later, he would be the one making history as the first Muslim and first epidemiologist elected to the US Senate.El-Sayed was born in Michigan to Egyptian parents. He spent his first two years of medical school at the University of Michigan, before taking time out to study public health at Oxford after winning a Rhodes scholarship. He then completed his medical degree at Columbia University.In 2014, after graduating, El-Sayed took up the role of assistant professor of epidemiology at Columbia—where he carried out research on poverty, marginalisation, obesity, and infant mortality. He was also known for being...