Our Team

Andy Burness

President

Andy Burness is the founder of Burness Communications, which marked its 25th anniversary in 2011. The company has been cited by Washingtonian magazine as one of 50 “Great Places to Work" in the Greater Washington area. Burness' work in domestic health and social welfare spans U.S. health policy to international development. He has provided counsel on communications and advocacy regarding care at the end of life, educational opportunity, adolescent health and behavior, AIDS, health care for the homeless, underage drinking, the uninsured, long-term care, and pain management, as well as numerous other issues under the broad umbrella of domestic well-being.

Andy's international work has taken him to more than 20 countries on four continents, where he has provided training and counsel regarding communications and advocacy on a range of issues, including agricultural research, vaccine development and public health interventions to control diseases of the developing world. He is fluent in Spanish, having lectured and conducted media outreach in Latin American countries, from Mexico to Argentina. Andy holds a faculty position as Lecturer at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore.

He has and continues to advise policy makers, nonprofit leaders, and research scientists on effective strategies for communicating with the public.

Before starting his firm, he was liaison with the public and primary spokesperson for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the largest private health philanthropy in the United States. Prior to that, Andy served as public information officer for the President's Commission on Medical Ethics. He was also a legislative assistant for health and education policy in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Andy has a bachelor of arts degree from Duke University and a master's degree in business administration from the University of Maryland. He lives with his wife Hope and their two children, Alex and Molly, and dog, Mo. When he isn't cheering for his beloved Duke Blue Devils, he plays tennis and pretends he can coach sports teams if anyone will listen.