Name: Deborah Azrael

Task Force Membership: Crime Trends Working Group

Job Title: Director of Research, Harvard Injury Control Research Center

Company Name: Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health

Bio: Azrael has over 25 years of experience conducting and leading grant-funded research on firearm violence, injury surveillance, and suicide prevention. She was co-director of the pilot program that later became the National Violent Death Reporting System, a 50-state surveillance system that collects data on all homicides, suicides, and unintentional firearm deaths. Much of Azrael’s scholarship, especially over the past decade, has focused on studies designed to inform interventions to reduce suicide. She has also designed and analyzed surveys of American adults’ gun-related behaviors and beliefs and has written dozens of articles exploring the relationship between access to firearms and suicide and the ways in which firearm owners store their guns. In 2015, The Trace named Azrael one of the 10 Americans who shaped the gun debate.