John Wong - Biography#
Professor John Eu-Li Wong, Isabel Chan Professor in Medical Sciences, is currently Senior Vice President (Health Innovation and Translation), National University of Singapore (NUS) and Senior Advisor, National University Health System (NUHS).
A medical oncologist-haematologist, Professor Wong obtained his MBBS from NUS and did his residency and fellowship at the New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center, where he was the Chief Resident in Medicine, and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.
In his leadership roles at NUS and NUHS, Professor Wong played a major role in the initiation and subsequent development of Singapore’s Health and Biomedical Sciences initiative, working closely with the late Professor Sydney Brenner, Professors George Radda, Alex Matter, Keith Peters, David Lane, Birgitte Lane, Edison Liu, Neal Copeland, Nancy Jenkins, Yoshiaki Ito, Ehud Razin, Daniel Tenen, Phillip Koeffler, the late Lorenz Poellinger, and more recently with Ashok Venkitaraman. He helped forge ties between Singapore and the Charite, Karolinska, University of Cambridge, University College London, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, TH Chan School of Public Health, Harvard University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Hadassah Medical Center, Vanderbilt University, Erasmus University Medical Center, Maastricht University, ETH Zurich, Stanford University, Columbia University, as well as the Christian Medical College, Vellore and leading medical schools in Australia, East and Southeast Asia.
He is Co-Chair of a United States of America National Academy of Medicine Commission developing a “Global Roadmap for Healthy Longevity”, a Council Member, M8 Alliance of Academic Health Centers where he was Past President of the World Health Summit in 2013, a founding Member of the Association of Academic Health Centers - International, and the Steering Committee of the Global Genomic Medicine Collaborative. He is a member of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on Personalized and Precision Medicine, the Nature Index Panel of Senior Medical Advisors, and sits on the Editorial Board of the Journal of the American Medical Association, the International Editorial Board of the American Journal of Medicine, and the Advisory Board to the Government of Qatar on Academic Medicine and Sidra Medicine.
He jointly founded the Cancer Therapeutics Research Group, a multinational consortium of nine academic institutions, and has served as a member of the International Education Council for Molecular Targeted Therapy for Cancer, the American Society of Clinical Oncology International Affairs Committee, and the International Oncology Foundation Advisory Board.
He was awarded the Degree of Doctor Philosophiae Honoris Causa from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 2019; Singapore National Day Awards 2016 - Public Administration Medal (Gold); Singapore’s President’s Science & Technology Medal in 2014; the Outstanding Service Award from the National University of Singapore in 2013; recognised by the NUS Medical Society in 2011 for his contributions to medical student education; the Singapore Medical Association Lecturer in 2010; the Sass Foundation Award in conjunction with MD Anderson Cancer Center in 2010; the National Outstanding Clinician Award in 2009 by the Ministry of Health; the Singapore National Day Awards 2005 - Public Administration Medal (Silver); and a Special Letter of Commendation from the Singapore Armed Forces in 1983. He is a Fellow of the Academy of Medicine Singapore, the Royal College of Physicians in Edinburgh and London, and the American College of Physicians. He was elected as an international member of the US National Academy of Medicine in 2019.
