A Special Legislative Commission on Behavioral Health Promotion and Upstream Prevention in Massachusetts
Expert in Mental and Behavioral Health Promotion
Christie Hager, a public health lawyer, is the Senior Vice President for National Client Partnerships, New England Region, at Beacon Health Options, a national, 50 million-member managed behavioral health organization. She came to Beacon after serving in the Obama Administration as Regional Director of Region I of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, from 2010 through 2014, where she oversaw the implementation of the Affordable Care Act in the six New England states, on behalf of the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Previously, she was Chief Health Counsel to the Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives during the development, drafting, and first three years of implementation of the Massachusetts health reform law enacted in 2006. Christie’s first post-graduate position was Research Assistant to the editorial leadership at the New England Journal of Medicine, and since then she has held research and operations positions at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in the Division of Public Health Practice, and at the Schneider Institute for Health Policy at Brandeis University’s Heller School, where she was appointed the first Senior Fellow. She has served as Chair of the American Public Health Association’s Health Law Forum, as President of the Massachusetts Public Health Association, and as Co-Chair of the Health Law Section of the Boston Bar Association.
Christie has held appointments on the faculties of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, University of Connecticut School of Medicine and Suffolk University Law School. Her work has appeared in such publications as the New England Journal of Medicine, American Journal of Law and Medicine, and Journal of Legal Medicine.
Chris holds an A.B. from Smith College, a M.P.H. from the Boston University School of Public Health, and a J.D. from the University of Connecticut School of Law.
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