Quam to lead global health program at State

Twin Cities health care executive Lois Quam has been tapped to lead a multibillion-dollar initiative at the U.S. State Department aimed at fighting preventable diseases around the world.

Quam on Wednesday also resigned from the board of directors at Golden Valley-based General Mills, where she had been a director since 2007.

Quam spent 17 years at Minnetonka-based UnitedHealth Group and was CEO of the division that oversaw its Medicaid and Medicare business. She spent two years at Piper Jaffray working on clean energy technology before founding the consulting firm Tysvar in 2009, where she said she was able to blend her two passions of universal health care reform and the emerging green economy.

President Obama has committed $63 billion over six years to the global health program, which Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has said is a "crucial component of American foreign policy." The initiative will work to fight HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis with the idea that improving health care will lead to more stable families and communities.

In 1993 and 1994, Quam was a top adviser to Clinton on rural heath issues. Quam is married to Matt Entenza, a former state lawmaker who ran for governor in 2010.