I’m a junior who wants to go into pharmaceutical or infectious disease research, but I’m scared that I might lose interest in it and have no career prospects. Are there any college majors that would prepare me for these types of research but also leave other jobs open in case I change my mind?
applied math. You can do almost anything with that major- actuarial science, risk management, finance, criminal justice reform, work for a large health insurer or hospital system, political campaign, marketing, supply chain management…
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chemistry is good prep for pharma research;
Infectious diseases research could come from an MD/PhD path (tough) or a public health path (easier).
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Chemistry or chemical engineering
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Not sure about the chem engg – i have friends who did chem engg and went into pharma companies, but they were doing process engineering, pressure vessel design, scaling up from lab to production etc.
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Yes that’s true. It would depend on if they wanted to go the pharmaceutical route or the disease route. A bachelor’s in chem is good for either career. But while it’s okay for job prospects if they change their mind, the chem degree isn’t nearly as good as a bachelor’s in chemE. That’s why I mentioned chemE, but it wouldn’t be ideal for a disease career. The infectious disease research career would likely require a graduate degree.
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Applied math with a minor in chemistry. Heavy on the statistics, some coding.
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I would reverse that – major in Chem with a minor in math/stat.
No one will take you seriously in Pharma if you are not chem
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Statistics (or applied math where statistics is part of the math department) with relevant electives (including their prerequisites) in biology and chemistry. Some social science courses may also be relevant (as in how human behavior affects spread of infections disease).
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I have worked in Pharma for almost 30 years, Bio, Biochem or chem. Some schools have clinical research path that is great too. All of those will get you into research but also many other things. I would generally not consider an engineer or CS major for Pharma research. Maybe a biomedical engineer or chem engineer… just depends.
Consider a data science major with the interactions of CHNOPS and microbiology as potential applied domains. With this approach, a second major in chemistry, biochemistry, or biology may be appropriate. For your goals, I’d recommend you avoid biomedical engineering as a major.