Ali Abazeed Is Detroit's New Chief Public Health Officer

Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield has appointed Ali Abazeed, M.P.H., M.P.P. as Detroit's new Chief Public Health Officer.  His background has some similarities to that of Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed, who is now running for U.S. Senate.  Abazeed, however, served in the Trump 45 National Institutes of Health (NIH) and then other federal positions into the Biden Administration:

https://detroitmi.gov/news/mayor-sheffield-appoints-ali-abazeed-mph-mpp-citys-new-chief-public-health-officer-tasks-him

Mayor Sheffield appoints Ali Abazeed, MPH, MPP, as City’s new Chief Public Health Officer; tasks him with incorporating public health into all aspects of City government
March 2, 2026

• Abazeed served as the founding director of Dearborn’s highly respected Health Department, building it from the ground up and establishing innovative, high-impact approaches to public health programming and communication
• Also brings years of experience at the federal level at the U.S Department of Health and Human Services, including substantial work within The National Institutes of Health
• Abazeed to lead key focus areas of the Sheffield Administration, including widely integrating public health concepts within City departments, strategies and operations to benefit the health and well-being of all Detroiters

Mayor Mary Sheffield today promised redoubled attention on the health of Detroit residents with the appointment of Ali Abazeed, MPH, MPP to serve as the City’s new Chief Public Health Officer. Abazeed comes from the City of Dearborn, where, as its Chief Public Health Officer he built the City’s local public health department from the ground up.

Mayor Sheffield’s overall vision includes the Detroit Health Department leading a city-wide “health in all policies” approach to public health. This means partnering with City departments to build internal policies that advance core public health principles in all operations, from economic development and transportation to public works and beyond. Abazeed used a strong policy background and penchant for tactical strategy and relationship-building to lead this very same best-practice approach as Dearborn’s Chief Public Health Officer.

“City government touches people’s lives in countless ways, which means there are countless ways we can apply public health considerations into the work every department is doing,” said Mayor Sheffield. “Ali’s work in Dearborn has shown the impact this can have and that’s the vision he is bringing to the Detroit Health Department. We are very fortunate to have someone with his balance of national health policy and strategy building and on-the-ground community health experience to lead our work.”

Born in Detroit and raised in Dearborn, Abazeed is a three-time graduate of the University of Michigan, earning an M.P.H., M.P.P., and B.S. He moved to Washington, D.C. in 2017, where he served as a public health advisor at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). There, he worked across the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as a Presidential Management Fellow (PMF) in the Office of the Secretary, Office of Refugee Resettlement, and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, advising senior federal leadership on policy and helping shape national priorities.

Returning to Michigan in 2022, Abazeed joined Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud’s Administration as its founding director of public health. After framing and leading the launch of the Dearborn Department of Public Health, he was named Chief Public Health Officer. Dearborn is now just the second city in Michigan besides Detroit with a standalone municipal health department.

“Public health is the foundation of opportunity. When children are healthy and neighborhoods are thriving, everything else becomes possible,” said Abazeed. “Under Mayor Sheffield’s leadership, Detroit has an opportunity to become a national model for what bold public health can achieve. The decisions we make across every department can help Detroiters live long and healthy lives.

“My commitment is simple: we will upgrade public health in this city,” Abazeed added. “We will protect what works, expand what’s possible, and build a culture where every department sees its work as contributing to the health of Detroiters. Detroit deserves a health department that is ambitious in vision, rigorous in execution, and relentless about results, and that’s exactly what we’re going to build.”

After launching the Department, his further accomplishments included achieving a 60% reduction in drug overdoses and expanding air quality monitoring across the city of Dearborn. He also brought the RxKids program to Dearborn, the same nationally recognized, critical cash assistance initiative that Mayor Sheffield recently launched locally, making Detroit the largest city to adopt the maternal and infant health program.

“Ali brings exactly the type of record of proven, data driven leadership that we want at the Health Department,” said Luke Shaefer who will oversee Detroit Health Department work as the Administration’s Chief Executive of Health, Human Services, and Poverty Solutions. “He uses evidence to inform action that benefits residents in concrete and tangible ways, and his approach is a perfect match for Mayor Sheffield’s vision to seek out innovative and cutting-edge ways to integrate health in everything we do.”

Mayor Sheffield’s Chief of Staff David Bowser said “Ali’s strategic synergy with this administration’s objectives is undoubtable. Poverty is a determining factor for large-scale health outcomes, and so pairing Luke Shaefer’s poverty alleviation focus with Ali’s proven ability to bridge silos and deploy bold, equitable and innovative public health interventions will be a huge leap forward for health outcomes in Detroit.”

In addition to his charge to apply a public health lens to all policies and city-wide strategies, Abazeed’s Sheffield Administration focus areas will include prioritizing chronic disease mitigation, driving further reductions in the city’s infant mortality rates, and reframing the Detroit Health Department’s public notification and education strategies with revised communications campaigns.