Dr. Vollinger is the Senior Policy Advisor in the Policy, Planning and Coordination Unit of the Office on Smoking and Health (OSH) at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). He provides leadership on policy, partnerships, planning, media relations, strategic messaging, and other major initiatives to support OSH’s tobacco prevention and control priorities. Bob helps coordinate the analysis and application of tobacco prevention and control policy and strategies in collaboration with CDC and HHS leaders; policymakers; State, tribal, and federal agencies; and non-governmental organizations to develop and support tobacco control priorities to fulfill OSH’s mission and goals. He leads a Community Engagement Workgroup to promote real world collaboration among researchers and public health practitioners to strengthen efforts to disseminate and implement research findings to advance comprehensive tobacco prevention and control policies at local, State, national and tribal levels.

Bob previously served as a Program Director in the Tobacco Control Research Branch at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) for over 25 years Bob also led numerous large NCI state and community-based research efforts and was the co-Senior Scientific Editor of NCI’s Tobacco Control Monograph – ASSIST: Shaping the Future of Tobacco Prevention and Control. His interests include: policy, media and population-based approaches to preventing and reducing tobacco use; clean indoor air and smokefree housing; state and community-based tobacco control interventions; community engagement and community organizing; health equity; health communications and social marketing; dissemination and implementation of research findings; and racial and social justice approaches to public health.

Dr. Vollinger earned a DrPH at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Department of Health, Behavior and Society. He also completed a Master of Science in Public Health from the Department of Health Policy and Administration at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Gillings School of Global Public Health and a Bachelor of Arts in Public Policy Studies and Religion from the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University, with concentrations in health policy and ethics.