The Good Fight: Legacy's Impact on Tobacco

Dr. Healton is the founding President & CEO of Legacy and has worked to further the foundation’s ambitious mission: to build a world where young people reject tobacco and anyone can quit. During her tenure with the foundation, she has guided the highly acclaimed, national youth tobacco prevention counter-marketing campaign, truth®, which has been credited in part with reducing youth smoking prevalence to near record lows. Under her leadership Legacy, which is dedicated to evidence-based public health strategies that work, has undertaken numerous other public education campaigns, research, technical assistance and a broad program of grant making.

Dr. Healton holds a doctorate from Columbia University's School of Public Health (with distinction) and a master's degree in Public Administration at New York University for Health Policy and Planning. She joined the American Legacy Foundation from Columbia University's Joseph L. Mailman School of Public Health in New York, where she served as Chair of the Division of Socio-medical Sciences and Associate Dean for Program Development. Dr. Healton's involvement with Columbia University spans three decades, in which she has served in a variety of administrative and faculty roles at the medical center and in public health, including Associate Dean of the Medical School.

She led grant-funded projects for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to study the effects of marketing and counter-marketing on youth tobacco use; developed a series of prevention partnerships linking public health researchers with New York state tobacco-health policy makers; evaluated intervention programs for the state's largest youth tobacco prevention program; worked at Columbia to bring an interdisciplinary approach to tobacco control and prevention, developing innovative grants which link academic researchers to public health practitioners.

She is a wife and mother of three, an author, researcher, professor, and public health administrator with more than 25 years’ experience and has served on a vast array of national, state, and local conferences, committees and task forces for public health and policy issues including HIV/AIDS, violence, and alcoholism. Active in grant support, she has been the principal investigator/program director for more than two-dozen grants and has published numerous articles on public health topics. Dr. Healton is currently writing a book on the topic of women and smoking, with common sense strategies to increase successful quit attempts.

She is also an active member of the broader public health community, serving on several boards. Dr. Healton is a thought-provoking public speaker and has given a multitude of presentations around the world. Considered bold, inspirational and humorous, she is a frequent commentator on national and local broadcasts and print news coverage of tobacco control issues, appearing on ABC’s Good Morning America; CNN’s Larry King Live; NBC’s Today, MSNBC’s Hardball with Chris Matthews, National Public Radio and more.