Myron S. Cohen is the Yeargan-Bate Eminent Professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology and Epidemiology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Cohen received his BS degree, Magna Cum Laude, from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana. He received an MD degree from Rush Medical College, Chicago Illinois. He completed training in internal medicine at the University of Michigan and training in infectious diseases at Yale University.
Dr. Cohen is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians and the Infectious Disease Society of America, and a member of the National Academy of Medicine, the American Society of Clinical Investigation, and the American Association of Physicians. Dr. Cohen serves as the Director of the UNC Division of Infectious Disease and the UNC Institute for Global Health and Infectious Disease, and as Associate Vice Chancellor for Global Health. Dr. Cohen serves as the co-principal investigator of the NIH HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN).
Dr. Cohen received the Distinguished Alumnus Award from Rush Medical College in 2000. He received the Distinguished Career Award for lifetime achievement in STD/HIV research from the American Sexually Transmitted Diseases Association in 2005. In 2008 Dr. Cohen received the O. Max Gardner Award, the highest honor in the University of North Carolina System. In 2013 Dr. Cohen received the Smadel Award from the Infectious Disease Society in recognition of his work in public health. Also in 2013, Dr. Cohen received the Award for Science from the State of North Carolina, its highest civilian honor
For three decades Dr. Cohen’s research has focused on the transmission and prevention of transmission of HIV. Dr. Cohen helped to develop laboratory methods to measure HIV in genital secretions, as well as methods to determine the best antiviral agents to reduce replication of HIV in these compartments. Dr. Cohen is the architect and Principal Investigator of the multinational HPTN 052 trial, which demonstrated that antiretroviral treatment of people with HIV infection prevents the sexual transmission of the virus. This work was recognized by Science Magazine as the “Breakthrough of the Year” in 2011.
Serving as Co-PI of the NIH HIV Prevention Trials Network Dr. Cohen has focused on the development of antiviral agents and broad neutralizing antibodies for pre-exposure prophylaxis of HIV (PrEP). These HPTN studies included collaboration in the development of the long-acting integrase inhibitor cabotegravir, and the broad neutralizing antibody VRCO1.
With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 Dr. Cohen was appointed to the Leadership Committee of the NIH COVID Prevention Network ( CoVPN). Dr. Cohen has focused on monoclonal antibodies for the prevention of COVID-19. He spearheaded a proof of concept study that demonstrated the Eli Lilly drug, bamlanivimab, could prevent COVID-19 in long term care facilities, and collaborated with investigators at Regeneron to show that the combination of antibodies called REGEN-COV, when administered subcutaneously, could prevent symptomatic COVID-19 after household exposure to an infected person.
Dr. Cohen is the author of more than 600 publications and one book. He has written extensively about the prevention of HIV infection and COVID-19. Much of Dr. Cohen’s research has been conducted over the past three decades in resource-constrained countries, especially in Malawi and in the People’s Republic of China.
