- Professor; Associate Director for Faculty Affairs
Berman Institute of Bioethics
Dr. Merritt is interested in questions of public health ethics in international public health research and practice. The two main lines of inquiry in her funded research portfolio have been: how to consider social justice in the economic evaluation of health policy options; and how to delineate researchers’ and sponsors’ ethical responsibilities regarding community members’ health needs in public health intervention research. A third, complementary line of inquiry is related to moral psychology — the study of feeling, thought, and action in morally significant contexts — and involves nurturing the capacity for wonder in educational settings for health professionals. Dr. Merritt’s current research agenda focuses on public health ethics in relation to the search for climate solutions.
Dr. Merritt served 2016-2020 as Associate Chair for Student Matters in the JHSPH Department of International Health, and 2015-2020 as Program Officer for the JHU Exploration of Practical Ethics. She was a Visiting Scholar at the NIH Department of Bioethics for academic year 2020-2021.
Research Interests
- Social justice in health-related policy decision making, with special attention to health care equity and climate justice in decarbonizing health systems
- How academic research institutions can best partner with communities to align the scientific agenda with community members’ own vision of a healthy life, specifically in the context of epidemiological research on infectious diseases sensitive to climate change
- Nurturing the capacity for wonder in educational settings for health professionals
Education
- B.S., Wake Forest University
- B.A., Oxford University
- Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley
- Postdoctoral Fellow, Dept. of Clinical Bioethics, NIH
Recent Publications
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Greene JA, Merritt MW, Paina L, Bucic SB, Dalesio N, Hanley C, Mediate E, Wadhwa S, Alfonzo Horowitz M, Gately UE, Tharp M, Singh H; PASS-UP Working Group. A Pragmatic Approach to Streamlining Single-Use Plastics in Health Care (2025). Annals of Internal Medicine 178(8):1192-1194. Published online 24 Jun 2025. https://doi.org/10.7326/ANNALS-25-01264
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Choi E, Merritt MW, and Geller G. Exploring Wonder in Medical School Admissions: Correlations with Admissions Decisions. International Journal of Medical Students (2025), 13(2):148-153. https://doi.org/10.5195/ijms.2025.3040
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Bennett S and Merritt MW (corresponding author), “Implications of the Fair Processes for Financing UHC Report for Development Assistance: Reflections and an Application of the Decision-Making Principles to PEPFAR,” Health Economics, Policy and Law (2025) 20(1):26-33. Published online 14 Jan 2025. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1744133124000276
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Black GF, Jamrozik E, Khan W, Peralta S, Havenga B, Merritt MW (co-senior author), and Kelley M, “Making the Case for Community Involvement in Research on Climate and Health: Opportunities and Lessons,” Frontiers in Climate (2024) 6:1456417. doi: https://doi.org/10.3389/fclim.2024.1456417
- Taylor HA, Dowdy DW, Searle AR, Stennett AL, Dukhanin V, Zwerling AA, Merritt MW (senior author), “Disadvantage and the Experience of Treatment for Multidrug-Resistant Tuberculosis (MDR-TB),” SSM – Qualitative Research in Health (2022): 2: 100042: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmqr.2022.100042