Halbert L. Dunn

Halbert Dunn
Born	1896 New Paris, Ohio
Died	1975 Silver Springs, Maryland
Nationality	American
Occupation	Medical practictioner

Halbert L. Dunn, M.D. (1896–1975) was the leading figure in establishing a national vital statistics system in the United States and is known as the "father of the wellness movement".

Born in New Paris, Ohio, he attended the University of Minnesota where he earned his M.D. in 1922 and his Ph.D. in 1923. He served as an assistant in medicine at Presbyterian Hospital of New York City 1923-1924 and as fellow in medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota (1924–1925).

In 1929, he was the first biostatistician hired by the Mayo Clinic and established its computer coding system for deriving medical statistics. He was Chief of the National Office of Vital Statistics from 1935 through 1960, first as part of the Bureau of the Census and later under the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, where it eventually became the National Center for Health Statistics in 1960. In his final year with the U.S. Public Health Service he was Assistant Surgeon General for aging.

He was one of the founders of the National Association for Public Health Statistics and Information Systems (NAPHSIS) and of the Inter-American Statistics Institute (IASI). He was Secretary General of the IASI from 1941 to 1952. The Halbert L. Dunn Award, named in his honor, has been presented since 1981 by NAPHSIS in recognition of outstanding and lasting contributions to the field of vital and health statistics.

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