6 things to know about Dr. Sten Vermund, our new College of Public Health dean
In January, Dr. Sten Vermund joined the university as dean of the College of Public Health, as well as Distinguished University Health Professor and senior associate vice president of USF Health. Also the chief medical officer of the Global Virus Network, he brings four decades of infectious disease epidemiology and prevention experience to his new role.
Here are six facts to help you get to know Dean Vermund.
1) He welcomes Florida’s warmer weather.
Vermund, whose parents immigrated from Norway, was born in Minnesota, and grew up in Wisconsin and California. He most recently moved from New Haven, Connecticut, where he served as dean and professor of the Yale School of Public Health and professor in pediatrics in the Yale School of Medicine.
Now that he can play golf year-round, he spends his free time teeing up, swinging a tennis racket and jogging when his running app reminds him to. “I’m kind of a pathetic jogger,” he says. “If you saw my pace, you might say, ‘That’s an interesting old man running down the street.’”
Most likely in his ear buds? “New York Tendaberry’’ by Laura Nyro, “Rubber Soul’’ by the Beatles, “Elis & Tom” by Antônio Carlos Jobim and Elis Regina, or “Breakin’ Away’’ by Al Jarreau.
2) He suggests the answer to a greener future is right above our heads.
Vermund strives to live an eco-friendly life and used to bike to work. In Connecticut, his family switched to all solar housing and bought an electric car. Their monthly electric bill dropped to zero.
“In Florida, the amount of solar energy that can be economically harvested by homeowners is vast, a high return on investment.”
3) He’s keen on collaboration and AI-integration.
The fields of epidemiology, health economics, biostatistics, health policy, laboratory science and others have undergone a radical expansion thanks to machine learning and data science, Vermund says. He looks forward to a curriculum that prepares students by integrating new technology like geosensing and includes collaboration with other colleges, such as the Bellini College of Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity and Computing, and community partners like Tampa General Hospital.
4) He says you must be both aggressive and patient to achieve.
Reflecting on his successful intervention to reduce HIV transmission from mothers to children in Zambia, he credits two qualities: aggressiveness and patience.
“You have to be aggressive because you have to find out, if you launch an initiative in a clinic, why is it not working optimally, and you have to be patient because you need to do the implementation science to figure out exactly how to fix it.”
5) He loves history and once contemplated being an archaeologist.
A secret weapon on trivia nights, Vermund is obsessed with history, the Spanish Civil War and the U.S. Civil Rights Movement since the 1950s. A bucket list item? “Someday I would like to visit Egypt with my family to see the Sphinx, the Pyramids, Luxor and the great museums,” he says.
6) His favorite food? His wife’s cooking.
Vermund’s wife, Dr. Pilar Vargas, is a native of Puerto Rico whose mother is from Spain. She serves up some of Vermund’s favorite dishes, which include Caribbean and Spanish cuisine, comida criolla.
“If she’s in the mood to whip up some of her local cuisine,” he says, “I’m there.”
As a retired pediatric psychiatrist, Dr. Vargas is helping ground the couple in Tampa and support her husband.
“The Tampa community has been most welcoming, and Pilar and I are most proud and pleased to be here in the vibrant USF ecosystem,” Vermund says.
- Molly Urnek, ’20 // Advancement
