Stephen Thomas is a physician-scientist and a professor of medicine, microbiology and immunology. He is the Chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases and Director of the Institute for Global Health and Translational Science at SUNY Upstate Medical University. Prior to joining Upstate, Thomas spent twenty years in the US Army Medical Corps serving at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research and completing his career as the institute’s Deputy Commander for Operations. Thomas specializes in the study of viruses and vaccine development. He played key leadership roles in the US government’s response to the West Africa Ebola outbreak and the MERS-CoV and Zika epidemics and was instrumental in the development and advancement of vaccines for each virus. His current research activities include developing vaccines and drugs against mosquito and tick-borne illnesses, vaccines against opioid use disorders, and field studies exploring global health challenges. During COVID, Thomas led SUNY Upstate’s Incident Command as they prepared and responded to infections in central New York. His team initiated numerous experimental COVID treatment trials and he is the coordinating principal investigator for Pfizer’s COVID vaccine trial. Thomas advises the World Health Organization, the US government, and academic and industry partners on global health and biomedical research. He is a frequent contributor to Forbes Magazine and scientific literature. Thomas earned his bachelor of arts with honors in biomedical ethics from Brown University, his medical degree from Albany Medical College, and completed his internal medicine residency and infectious diseases fellowship at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.