In Memoriam: Gail Wilensky
Gail Wilensky, who was the John M. Olin Senior Fellow at Project HOPE, has passed away. At Project HOPE, Gail analyzed and developed policies relating to health care reform and changes in the medical marketplace.
Gail testified frequently before Congressional committees, advised members of Congress and other elected officials, and spoke nationally and internationally before professional, business and consumer groups. From 1997 to 2001, she chaired the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission. From 1995 to 1997, she chaired the Physician Payment Review Commission.
Previously, she served as Deputy Assistant to President George H.W. Bush for Policy Development, advising him on health and welfare issues. Prior to that, she was Administrator of the Health Care Financing Administration, now the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), overseeing the Medicare and Medicaid programs.
Gail was a member of the Institute of Medicine and its Governing Council. She also served as: an advisor to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Commonwealth Fund; a director on several corporate boards; a trustee of the Combined Benefits Fund of the United Mine Workers of America; a trustee of the National Opinion Research Center (NORC); the Board of Regents of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS); the Visiting Committee of the Harvard Medical School; and the Board of Directors of the Geisinger Health System Foundation. An elected member of Institute Of Medicine, Gail served two terms on its governing council.
A Member of the Academy since 1993, Gail served on the Academy’s Restructuring Medicare for the Long Term Steering Committee in 2002 and the Academy’s Study Panel on Medicaid as a Critical Lever in Building a Culture of Health in 2016. She spoke at the Academy’s 27th annual policy conference, Medicare and Medicaid: The Next 50 Years in 2014. She was also interviewed as part of the Academy’s 2016 publication, How Things Get Done in Washington: Insights from 23 Former CMS Leaders. (https://www.nasi.org/discussion/how-things-get-done-in-washington-insights-from-23-former-cms-leaders/)
She received her Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan.
May she rest in peace.