Linda P. Fried, MD, MPH: A Legacy of Leadership in Public Health and Aging
Shaping a Future Where Aging Means Thriving
As we celebrate our newest recipient of the Alma Dea Morani, MD Renaissance Woman Award, it’s fitting to reflect on the extraordinary life and career of our 2019 honoree and this year's presenter, Dean Linda P. Fried.
Today, Linda P. Fried stands as one of the world’s foremost leaders in public health and geriatrics. As the Dean of Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health since 2008, has led the institution to lead the interdisciplinary science and education critical to solving 21st century threats to health. Her groundbreaking research has redefined how we understand aging and create health, health policy, and the potential of longer life spans. Her pioneering work on frailty as a medical syndrome and her creation of community-based interventions through senior volunteering like Experience Corps have changed the lives of countless older adults and young students alike. She is recognized as one of the top minds in science, the field of aging, and public health.
But behind these accomplishments is a deeply personal story, shaped by her upbringing in a vibrant, post-war New York City and the trailblazing influence of her mother.
Born in New York City in 1949, Linda P. Fried entered the world in a distinctly post-war era. Her father, George Fried, was an administrator with the New York State Supreme Court probation department, her mother, Adrienne Block, a musician. Throughout Fried’s childhood, New York City was at the heart of many significant cultural movements. The city’s daily life—marked by numerous worker strikes, the World’s Fair, and the Civil Rights movement—sparked in Fried an interest in people’s unique experiences, societally-induced disadvantages, and the concerns of the broader community. Her upbringing was rich and varied, as she volunteered in NYC politics, attended synagogue, studied in the NY City libraries, and played the flute.
Fried’s mother, Adrienne Fried Block, had gone to work during the war, and thereafter taught piano and music and raised her two young daughters. Despite not having attended college at the typical time in life, she continued her academic pursuits. She obtained her BA and masters degrees while working, as Fried was growing up, and achieved her Doctor of Musicology in her fifties and reached the pinnacle of her music career in her sixties and beyond. Teaching, lecturing, and publishing articles on women in American music, she conducted and taught at several schools including the Dalcroze School of Music, and the CUNY graduate center. As noted by her colleagues, Dr. Block’s age never affected her work or output. She demonstrated that learning continues regardless of one's stage in life. She found continued happiness in uncovering new information and exploring new ways of thinking, which she sustained until her death in 2009. In addition, working in a male-dominated university environment, Dr. Block exemplified how to thrive and transform the field so women could take their full place. She was an inspiration to her two young daughters, demonstrating that a woman can achieve extraordinary things throughout life, and when necessary, by challenging the status quo.
Following in her mother’s footsteps, and propelled by her example, Fried excelled at Hunter College High School in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. She later attained a history degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Unsure of what career she desired, Fried worked as a paralegal and then as a caseworker in Chicago at the Illinois Department of Public Aid. During this time, she began training in Aikido, the art of nonviolent self-defense. This training has provided important skills to “focus on the problem at hand and to maintain a sense of equilibrium, while intervening to accomplish the best outcome possible” (Newman, 2022), a skill that Fried would use throughout her life and career. Working with people on disability assistance, Fried could not ignore the stark differences that existed between her daily life and the lives of those in ill health. Her interactions with clients made her keenly aware of how health policy and the environment either promoted good health, or significantly hindered it.
Acting on this awareness and armed with the desire to contribute to other’s betterment, Fried earned a medical degree from Rush Medical College in Chicago in 1979. She then went on to attain a Master of Public Health at The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in 1984.
In 1982, Dr. Fried married Dr. Joseph B. Margolick, a medical staff fellow at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health. Their family grew with the births of two boys, Jon and Alex.
After receiving a fellowship at The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health where she studied internal medicine and epidemiology, Dr. Fried began collaborating with Dr. Bill Hazzard, a renowned expert in geriatrics. During this time, she became acutely aware of the significant challenges posed by the aging U.S. population and the impact it would have on the future of health.
She found herself grappling with critical questions, “Medicine has extended life-expectancy, but are people just living longer in poor health?” “Why is the term ‘frailty’ in geriatrics so poorly defined?” Inspired by her mother’s lifelong pursuit of purpose, Dr. Fried also wondered, “how do we best optimize health in longer lives”; “How can older adults use their now longer lives to continue to make contributions?”, and “How can they find purpose and fulfillment in these later years?”
Encouraged by Dr. Hazzard, Dr. Fried made a pivotal decision—she shifted her career focus overnight and trained in geriatric medicine.
Dr. Fried went on to make groundbreaking contributions to the fields of geriatrics and public health. Over the course of her career, she conducted research that defined frailty in aging as a new medical syndrome with distinct phenotypic presentation, etiology, and outcomes, and defined the causes, consequences and opportunities for prevention of cardiovascular disease and disability in aging. She co-designed and founded a novel, scientifically designed community-based public health intervention to prevent frailty and cognitive and functional decline in older adults called Experience Corps. In this program, older adults serve to improve the academic outcomes of young students in public elementary schools. Led by AARP, Experience Corps now operates in 24 US cities. She has also developed the concept that longer lives could lead to a Third Demographic Dividend in which all age groups could flourish due to longevity.
Dr. Fried went on to become the Director of the Division of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology and Founding Director of the Center on Aging and Health (Center of Excellence for Aging Research) at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. At Johns Hopkins, she also initiated and led the transformation of the Department of Medicine to enable equitable opportunity for success for women faculty, as the founding Director of the Task Force on Women’s Academic Careers in Medicine from 1988 to 1995. Since 2008, Dr. Fried has been Dean and DeLamar Professor of Public Health at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, where she is also Professor of Epidemiology and of Medicine; Senior Vice President, Columbia University Medical Center; and Director, Robert N. Butler Columbia Aging Center.
She has guided Columbia Public Health to become a leader in public health education innovation in the US. After she transformed the Columbia MPH curriculum to meet 21st-century needs, it became the accreditation standard. She has also developed a diverse array of programs to tackle pressing issues impacting the public’s health, such as the health effects of climate change and strategies for extending healthy lifespans in an aging society.
Dean Linda P. Fried’s career is a testament to the power of curiosity, compassion, and the pursuit of meaningful change. From her early days shaped by the cultural vibrancy of New York City to her groundbreaking work in public health and aging, she has consistently pushed boundaries and challenged conventional thinking. Inspired by her mother’s legacy of lifelong learning and resilience, Dr. Fried has dedicated her career to addressing some of the most pressing challenges of our time—ensuring that longer lives are not just extended but enriched, and society and all ages flourish. We celebrate not only her remarkable contributions to science and public health but also her unwavering commitment to making the world a better place for people of all ages. Dean Fried reminds us that with each new stage of life comes the opportunity for continued growth, purpose, and impact.