Terry M. McGovern

Prior to joining the Ford Foundation in 2006, Ms. McGovern was assistant professor of clinical population and family health, and socio-medical sciences at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health.
She also served as director of the Women's Health and Human Rights Advocacy Project at the school.
In 1989, Ms. McGovern founded the HIV Law Project in New York City and served as the executive director for 10 years.
She successfully litigated numerous cases against federal, state and local governments, including: S.P.
v.
Sullivan, which forced the Social Security Administration to expand HIV-related disability criteria so women and low-income people could qualify for Medicaid and Social Security; and T.N.
v.
FDA, which eliminated a 1977 Food and Drug Administration guideline that restricted the participation of women of childbearing potential in early phases of clinical trials.
As a member of the National Task Force on AIDS Drug Development, Ms. McGovern wrote the 2001 federal regulation authorizing the FDA to halt any clinical trial for a life-threatening disease that excludes women.
While at the HIV Law Project, she also developed a client training program, which prepares HIV-positive women to have an impact in the policy-making arena.
Ms. McGovern has a J.D.
from Georgetown University Law School and a bachelor's degree from The State University of New York.
She has published extensively and has testified numerous times before Congress and other policy-making groups.