Contributor

Jeff Ritterman, MD

Vice President of the Board of Directors, San Francisco Bay Area chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility

Jeff Ritterman, MD, retired as chief of cardiology at Kaiser Richmond in 2010, where he had worked since 1981.

Dr. Ritterman currently serves as Vice President of the Board of Directors of the San Francisco Bay Area chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility.

For the past 35 years, Dr. Ritterman has worked to put a human face on tragedies across the globe. He was a cofounder of The Committee for Health Rights in Central America, The Salvadoran Medical Relief Fund, and the Southern Africa Medical Aid Fund. He has personally delivered medical supplies to Salvadoran refugees living in camps in Honduras and Costa Rica during the war in El Salvador in the 1980s. He has also delivered medical supplies to the African National Congress's clinic in Lusak, Zambia, prior to the end of Apartheid. And after returning from a Peace Delegation to Amman, Jordan, in 2005, Dr. Ritterman spoke widely on the "Medical and Human Rights Consequences of the War in Iraq."

From 2008 until 2012, Dr. Ritterman served on the City Council of Richmond, CA. As a councilman, Dr. Ritterman has introduced legislation to turn health research into municipal policy. Due to his efforts, Richmond’s tobacco prevention ordinances are now models for the state. The Soda Tax campaign was initiated and led by Dr. Ritterman as a policy response to the worsening childhood obesity epidemic in Richmond. Dr. Ritterman is also actively working to educate the public on the adverse health impacts of climate change as well as our industrial food system.