Dr. John Bartlett, a widely respected infectious disease specialist who played a role in the growth of Baltimore’s nationally renowned Johns Hopkins Hospital, has died. He was 83.

Bartlett was known as an early pioneer in HIV and AIDS research and treatment. At the Johns Hopkins Hospital, he is credited with building the once-small infectious diseases division into a major center that treated more than 5,000 patients annually.
His death on Jan. 19 was announced last week by Johns Hopkins Medicine, which did not state a cause of death.

Bartlett and his wife Jean, who died last year, moved to Tupelo, Mississippi, after his retirement in 2014. There, he continued to write journal articles and deliver speeches, both nationally and at the North Mississippi Health Services annual meetings, according to the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal.

“John Bartlett was a giant in the field of infectious diseases, a visionary who anticipated all the most exciting developments and led the efforts to combat foes from HIV to antimicrobial resistance,” Dr. David Thomas, current director of the Division of Infectious Diseases, said in a Johns Hopkins statement.