Suzet McKinney

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Suzet McKinney is an American public health and biosecurity expert, medical and life sciences executive, and emergency preparedness and response strategist. She has taught Public Health at UIC School of Public Health and Harvard’s Chan School of Public Health.

Born and raised on the south side of Chicago, Illinois, McKinney attended and graduated from Whitney Young Magnet High School before earning a Bachelor of Arts in Biology from Brandeis University as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellow in 1996.^[1] She earned a master’s degree in public health from Benedictine University in Lisle, Illinois in 2001, as well as certificates in Health Care Administration and Managed Care.^[2] In 2009, she earned her doctoral degree in Public Health from the University of Illinois Chicago School of Public Health.^[3] The focus of her doctorate was "preparedness planning, leadership and workforce development”.^[4]

McKinney was tapped to direct Chicago's Ebola Response between 2014 and 2015, as well as the operations of responding to the 2009 H1N1 outbreak.^[4]In 2015, McKinney was serving as a Senior Advisor for Public Health and Preparedness at the Tauri Group, consulting on their behalf with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's BioWatch program, where she focused in part on the development of chemical and biological threat detection systems. She also held the position of Deputy Commissioner of the Bureau of Public Health Preparedness and Emergency Response at the Chicago Department of Public Health, where she directed the Department's emergency response and preparedness efforts, as well as ensured that the entirety of the city implemented these policies. While at the CDPH, she was placed in charge of the Division of Women and Children's Health. In addition, she consulted with and helped to support the U.S. Department of Defense's Defense Threat Reduction Agency as a biological terrorism preparedness advisor to Poland.^[3]

Around 2016, McKinney began working as the CEO and Executive Director of the Illinois Medical District, before transitioning to the head the Life Sciences Division at real estate developer Sterling Bay.^[5] Illinois Governor J. B. Pritzker commissioned McKinney as the Operations Lead for the Alternate Care facilities in response to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, while she was serving as CEO and Executive Director of the IMD.^{[citation needed]}

In 2020, Chicago Magazine named McKinney in their list of 50 of Chicago's Most Powerful Women, where she ranked 46th.^[6]

In 2021, McKinney left the IMD to become Principal and Director of Life Sciences at real estate developer Sterling Bay.^[4] During and after the COVID-19 crisis, one of McKinney’s primary concerns was the adverse effect of the pandemic on underserved and minority populations in Illinois and around the country.^[7] Following the highlighting of disparity following the pandemic, and the historic “gap” that lies between the median household income of black versus white households in Chicago, in 2022, McKinney joined the Chicago Urban League as Board Chair, where she is still currently holding that position.^[8]

McKinney has served on the boards of directors at Wintrust Wealth Management, and Forbes Council. She also serves as a member of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ Science and Security Board, where she has contributed to discussions around bio security and the doomsday clock.^[9]