Professor Michael Edelstein is a UK-trained Public Health physician specializing in infectious disease and vaccine epidemiology. He joined the Bar-Ilan University Azrieli Faculty of Medicine, based in Safed, as associate professor, in August 2020. His major research interests focus on the equitable delivery of public health programs, harnessing digital tools (and data in particular) to improve public health, applied principally, but not exclusively, to immunization programs.

Prior to joining Bar-Ilan University, Professor Edelstein was responsible for improving vaccine coverage data and optimizing the quality and use of data to improve the national immunization program across the life-course and to reduce inequalities at PHE, England’s national public health agency. He was also a member of England’s national COVID-19 surveillance team. As an honorary associate professor of Public Health at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, his research focused on barriers and enablers to reducing health inequalities in vaccine programs. He was the president of the infectious diseases section of the European Public Health Association (EUPHA) between 2018 and 2021.

Professor Edelstein is also deputy editor of the journal Epidemiology and Infection, and a fellow of the UK Faculty of Public Health. He serves on the national immunization advisory committee to the Israeli Ministry of Health, and has served on expert groups for the World Health Organization and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. He has over 65 peer-reviewed publications