Vice President, Global Biological Policy and Programs
Expertise Biosecurity
Jaime Yassif serves as Vice President of NTI Global Biological Policy and Programs (NTI | bio). In this role she oversees NTI | bio’s work to reduce global catastrophic biological risks, strengthen biosecurity and pandemic preparedness, and drive progress in advancing global health security.
Prior to this, Dr. Yassif served as a Program Officer at the Open Philanthropy Project, where she led the initiative on Biosecurity and Pandemic Preparedness. In this role, she recommended and managed approximately $40 million in biosecurity grants, which rebuilt the field and supported work in several key areas, including: development of new biosecurity programming at several leading think tanks; cultivation of new talent through biosecurity leadership development programs; initiation of new biosecurity work in China and India; establishment of the Global Health Security Index; development of the Clade X tabletop exercise; and the emergence of a new discussion about global catastrophic biological risks.
Previously, Yassif was a Science and Technology Policy Advisor at the U.S. Department of Defense, where she focused on oversight of the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program and East Asia security issues. During this period, she also worked on the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) at the Department of Health and Human Services, where she helped lay the groundwork for the WHO Joint External Evaluations and the GHSA Steering Group.
Yassif’s previous experience includes work with Connecting Organizations for Regional Disease Surveillance, Chatham House, NTI, the Federation of American Scientists and the Tsinghua University Institute for International Studies.
She holds a Biophysics Ph.D. from UC Berkeley, an MA in Science and Security from the King’s College London War Studies Department, and a BA in Biology from Swarthmore College.
A new NTI | bio report describes the status of benchtop DNA synthesis devices, explains the risks for biosecurity, and recommends action and oversight by governments, industry, and the scientific community.
In an op-ed for The Hill, NTI Senior Advisor Angela Kane and Vice President for Global Biological Policy and Programs Jaime Yassif acknowledge the importance of the ongoing investigation into the source of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In a new opinion piece for The Economist, Jaime Yassif makes the case for urgent action to create stronger guardrails for bioscience and biotechnology.
Establishing stronger norms and practices to prevent accidents, misuse, and other adverse outcomes of life science research
Rapidly assessing origins of high-consequence global biological events
Establishing an international Common Mechanism for DNA Synthesis Screening
Safeguarding modern bioscience and biotechnology so it can advance and flourish safely and responsibly
Preventing global catastrophic biological risks (GCBRS)
Advances in biotechnology outpace national governments’ ability to provide needed oversight to prevent accidents or deliberate misuse of dangerous biological agents.
