Founder & CEO

Vannessa J. Harrison, DrPH

Dr. Vannessa J. Harrison is a Doctor of Public Health, epidemiologist, and founder building AI-native digital health infrastructure at the intersection of human-centered AI, health equity, and non-clinical determinants of well-being. With over 27 years of hands-on web design and development experience and more than a decade of experience in global pharmaceutical and public health systems, she brings a rare combination of deep technical fluency and health-sector leadership to her work.

She is the Founder & CEO of Open Altar, an AI-driven, multi-faith platform designed to support personalized meaning-making, reflection, and moral resilience for individuals and communities historically underserved by traditional healthcare and institutional systems. Her work applies machine learning, large language models, and longitudinal personalization frameworks to translate complex human needs—such as grief, burnout, identity, and ethical discernment—into scalable, ethical digital systems that complement (but do not replace) clinical care.

Trained in epidemiology, neuroscience, and digital health, Dr. Harrison brings a systems-level perspective to health technology, with deep expertise in social determinants of health, health equity, and population-level risk. Her prior work spans over a decade in the pharmaceutical industry, global pharmaceutical strategy, public health preparedness, and data-driven policy, including leadership roles focused on market access, patient engagement, and equitable innovation in healthcare.

Earlier in her career, she served as an Emergency Preparedness and Response Planner at the NYC Department of Health & Mental Hygiene, where she developed preparedness strategies for pandemics, biological and chemical threats, and climate-related disasters. She has also worked internationally on maternal and neonatal health initiatives in Vietnam.

Dr. Harrison is a Bill & Melinda Gates Millennium Scholar and was nominated by Takeda as a 2023 Aspen Ideas Health Fellow, representing the company at Aspen's flagship forum on the future of health, ethics, and systems change.

Her current interests include human-centered AI, applied machine learning in health, digital health equity, ethical technology design, non-clinical determinants of health, and building responsible, durable health-tech infrastructure.