Lee, Philip R.

Philip R. Lee is an academic who has served as a senior federal health policy official in two administrations. He also is a frequent advisor to federal, state, and local health policy makers.

Born in San Francisco, Lee grew up in Palo Alto, California, and is one of five children, all of whom became practicing physicians. Lee earned a medical degree from Stanford University in 1948. He joined the U.S. Navy and served as a medical officer from 1949 to 1951. From 1951 to 1956, Lee was a fellow at the New York University's Medical Center and Goldwater Hospital. He completed a fellowship at Mayo Clinic from 1953 to 1955 and earned a master's degree from University of Minnesota in 1955. From there, Lee rejoined the faculty at New York University until he returned to Palo Alto in 1956. There, he worked as an internist at the Palo Alto Medical Clinic, which was founded by his father, Russell Lee, in 1930.

As a practicing physician during the 1960s, Lee joined a group called the Chowder and Marching Society, headed by Lester Breslow. The society met monthly and presented papers on various health policy topics. Also during this time, Lee was one of the founders of the Bay Area Committee for Medical Aid for the Aged. Additionally, he became actively involved in the King-Anderson Bill, which later became Medicare Part A. It was during this time that he became interested in governmental policies and practices.

In 1963, Lee left his medical practice and joined the federal government, becoming the director of health services in the Office of Technical Cooperation and Research in the Agency for International Development (AID). While in that position, he assisted in developing the first federal policies on family planning, malaria control, environmental sanitation, medical education, and the Food for Peace program. Additionally, he worked to better coordinate AID with the U.S. Public Health Service.

From 1965 to 1969, Lee served as the first assistant secretary in the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare (now split into the Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services) under President Lyndon B. Johnson. In his position, Lee was involved in a wide range of policy issues, including bioethics, biomedical research, environmental health, family planning, and the education of health professionals. One of his main tasks was to implement the Medicare program, which was passed in 1965.

From 1969 to 1972, Lee served as the chancellor of the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), where he helped increase the enrollment of minority students, particularly in the health professions. In 1972, while he was a professor in the School of Medicine, he founded the Institute for Health Policy Studies, which was the first of its kind in the nation. Lee served as the director of the institute until 1993, when he retired from UCSF to accept the appointment of Assistant Secretary for Health in the Department of Health and Human [Page 682]Services under President Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1997. Additionally, Lee served in several other capacities. He was the first president of the San Francisco Health Commission. He served on the Board of Trustees of the Carnegie Corporation and the Mayo Foundation. And he headed the federal Physician Payment Review Commission (PPRC) from 1986 to 1993.

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