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Associate Professor of Medicine, Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine
Director of Emerging Pathogens, The Institute of Global Health and Infectious Diseases
Director, UNC Special Pathogens Response Center, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine

William Fischer is a Pulmonary and Critical Care physician-scientist and Director of Emerging Pathogens at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine with an expertise in severe emerging viral infections. He graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine and completed a residency in Internal Medicine and a fellowship in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at the Johns Hopkins Hospital where he was Assistant Chief of Service.

Dr. Fischer has extensive field experience providing care during outbreaks of high consequence pathogens in resource limited settings with multiple deployments as a WHO critical care physician to care for patients with Ebola virus disease (EVD) in Gueckedou, Guinea – the epicenter of the 2014-2016 Ebola virus epidemic, N’zerekore in response to a resurgence of EVD, the Democratic Republic of Congo for outbreaks in 2018 and 2019 where he helped launch the use of novel therapeutics, Azerbaijan and the Republic of Korea in the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Entebbe and Mubende, Uganda for the Sudan virus disease outbreak in 2022, and most recently Kigali, Rwanda for the Marburg virus disease outbreak in 2024.

Dr. Fischer has active research programs exploring the clinical complications of Ebola virus disease, the prevalence, pathogenesis, and persistence of Lassa Fever (PREPARE, ENABLE 1.0, and ENABLE 1.5 studies), and served as one of the principal investigators for PREVAIL IV, an NIH study evaluating the efficacy of Remdesivir in reducing or eliminating Ebola virus persistence in male EVD survivors.  He has served as a principal investigator for trials evaluating novel antivirals for COVID-19, was the critical care specialist for ACTIV-2 and is the Vice Chair of the ACTG trial to evaluate the safety and efficacy of Tecovirimat in MPOX (STOMP).