Gail Wilensky

Dr. Gail Wilensky, PhD, a seminal figure in U.S. health policy, was devoted to ensuring affordable and accessible health care for all Americans while also improving health system performance and efficiency, died in her home on July 11, 2024, at the age of 81. She is survived by Robert, her loving husband of 60 years; her brother Gary Roggin; her son Peter (Shawn), her daughter Sara (Trish), and her five grandchildren.
A health economist by training, Dr. Wilensky gained early recognition for her work in developing what ultimately became one of the nation's most important ongoing surveys of health insurance coverage, health care access, and health care utilization: the National Medical Care and Expenditures Survey. Of particular importance, this survey system, which remains a core feature of U.S. policymaking, was designed to capture crucial economic and demographic information about Americans; its findings yielded some of the earliest evidence regarding health care inequality among low income people and minoritized communities. Over five decades, the results from this survey have served as the basis for major health policy reforms championed by Democrats and Republicans alike, including foundational improvements in Medicare and Medicaid, and ultimately, in enactment of the Affordable Care Act.
Dr. Wilensky spent over three decades of her career at Project HOPE, a leading global health and humanitarian organization. She was appointed by President George H.W. Bush as the head of the Health Care Financing Administration, where she both shaped important legislation and oversaw its implementation. Her leadership within HHS was followed by a senior White House appointment during the final year of the Bush presidency. During her governmental tenure, Dr. Wilensky focused on physician and hospital payment reform, health care performance improvement, the enactment of crucial improvements in Medicaid coverage of children, and reforms that ultimately enabled a historic expansion of the nation's community health centers.
Over the years, Dr. Wilensky assumed dozens of leadership and advisement roles including participation in the Congressional Physician Payment Review Commission, the Congressional Medicare Payment Review Commission, the President's Task Force to Improve Veterans' Health Care, the Department of Defense Task Force on the Future of Military Health Care, and the Defense Health Board. Indicative of her dedication to improving the health care of our country's service members, Dr. Wilensky traveled to military hospitals in Iraq and Germany to gain firsthand knowledge about ways to improve the military's health care system. Dr. Wilensky also served on numerous private, public, charitable, and foundation boards, was a much sought-after lecturer in advanced health policy programs at leading academic centers. She was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in recognition of her contributions to U.S. health policy.
Dr. Wilensky was devoted to her alma mater, the University of Michigan, where she earned her BA in Psychology and PhD in Economics and served on the Dean's Advisory Committee for the Univ. of Michigan's College of Literature, Science and the Arts (and met her husband, Robert!). She was thrilled to create an endowed chair in Applied Economics and Public Policy to help future researchers at Michigan continue her important work.
Graveside services will be held Sunday, July 14, 2024, 2 p.m., at Judean Memorial Gardens, 16225 Batchellors Forest Rd., Olney, MD 20832. The Family will be sitting Shiva following the burial, 6 p.m. at the Wilensky residence. Anyone wishing to honor Dr. Wilensky's life is encouraged to send a gift to either Project HOPE or the Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. Services entrusted to Sagel Bloomfield Danzansky Goldberg Funeral Care.