Henrique Barros was born in Porto, in 1957, and graduated in Medicine in 1981. During 1988-89 was research fellow at the Internal Medicine department of Lund´s University Hospital. In 1991 became Gastroenterology specialist and defended his PhD, with research on the epidemiology of viral hepatitis. He is Full Professor of Epidemiology at the University of Porto since 1999. He launched the Master Programs in Public Health, Epidemiology and Sociology and Health as well as the doctoral program in Public Health at the University of Porto and the doctoral program in Global Public Health (program director), a joint program with University NOVA of Lisbon, financed by the Portuguese Research Foundation (FCT). He was a member of the Scientific Council for Health Sciences Foundation for Science and Technology (2004-12), National Coordinator of the HIV/AIDS Program (2005-11) and member of the Medical Sciences (MED) Scientific Committee of Science Europe (2012-15).
He is currently, member of the Executive Commission of the National Ethical Committee for Clinical Investigation (CEIC), President of the Institute of Public Health, University of Porto, President of the Association of Schools of Public Health in the European Region (ASPHER) and Past-President of the International Epidemiological Association (2017-20). He has developed research in national and international projects, in areas such as clinical and perinatal epidemiology, cardiovascular, infectious and cancer diseases, which resulted in (co)authorship of hundreds of scientific publications in international journals.