AVMA recognizes Granger for public service

Dr. Larry M. Granger accepted the AVMA Public Service Award at a reception Aug. 1 following the AVMA Global Health Summit at AVMA Convention 2022 in Philadelphia.

Dr. Granger (Michigan State ’79) worked in private practice until 1988, licensed in Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana. He then joined the Michigan Department of Agriculture as a swine specialist, leading the pseudorabies eradication effort. He moved into the MDA Office of Economic Development in 1994 and engineered feasibility studies forming the Michigan Turkey Growers Cooperative. In 1999, he returned to the MDA Animal Industry Division to lead the Bovine Tuberculosis Eradication Program.

In 2003, he joined Veterinary Services within the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Health Plant Inspection Service as associate deputy administrator for emergency management. He led an APHIS monkeypox investigation, national surveillance for exotic Newcastle disease, the response to bovine spongiform encephalopathy, and the response to H5N1 avian influenza. He led formation of the National Animal Health Laboratory Network and the National Veterinary Stockpile. He had oversight of the National Veterinary Services Laboratories and the transition of the NVSL Foreign Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory on Plum Island, New York, to the Department of Homeland Security.

He was director of Veterinary Services’ Center for Epidemiology and Animal Health from 2006-13. Dr. Granger most recently served as a senior leader for the national multiagency initiative to address antimicrobial resistance, led revisions to the National Aquatic Animal Health Plan, and served again as an associate deputy administrator for Veterinary Services during his last year before retirement in January 2022.