Betsy McCaughey

Betsy McCaughey is a patient advocate, health policy expert, and former Lt. Governor of New York State. In 2005, she founded and is now Chairman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths (also known as RID), a nationwide educational campaign to stop hospital-acquired infections. RID has made hospital infections a major public issue. It has provided compelling evidence that preventing infection improves hospital profitability as well as saving lives, and RID has won legislation in 37 states and Washington, D.C. for public reporting of infection rates. RID has become synonymous with patient safety and clean hospital care.

McCaughey’s research on how to prevent infection deaths has been featured on Good Morning America, the CBS Morning Show, ABC’s 20/20, and many other national programs.

McCaughey is the author of more than one hundred scholarly and popular articles on health policy, infection, and Medicare. Her 1994 analysis of the dangers of the Clinton health plan in The New Republic won a National Magazine Award for the best article in the nation on public policy. Her most recent healthcare publication is The Next Pandemic, (Encounter Books, 2020).

Prior to entering the health policy field, McCaughey earned a Ph.D. in constitutional history from Columbia University. She is the author of two books on that subject. She has taught at Vassar College and Columbia University, and she produced prize-winning studies while at two think tanks, the Manhattan Institute and later the Hudson Institute.

From 1995 to 1998, she served as Lt. Governor of New York State. She focused on health issues, and her bills became models for legislation in many states and in Congress.

McCaughey is also a weekly columnist for the New York Post, and her work is syndicated nationwide.

She serves on the board of Synexis, a biodefense company providing technologies to eradicate pathogens in hospitals, public spaces, and manufacturing facilities. Her focus is on regulatory issues. McCaughey also serves on the Mount Sinai Lung Cancer Advisory Board and the board of the nonprofit Yankee Institute, a think tank that promotes fiscal integrity and sound state policies.