Levin was a 1967 graduate of the New York UniversitySchool of Medicine. Levin then spent a decade practicing general medicine in the working class town of Pottstown, Pennsylvania. Following this formative experience, he came to Mount Sinai to receive his training in occupational medicine. Following completion of his training, he joined the Mount Sinai faculty. He spent the remainder of his career at Mount Sinai, rose through the academic ranks and was promoted to full professor in 2011. Levin became medical director of the Mount Sinai Selikoff Center in 1987. He was active in the occupational medicine teaching program for medical students and residents. His research interests focused on asbestos-related disease, other occupational lung diseases and heavy metal toxicity.
In the 1990s, Levin helped ensure that federal and New York State authorities required the provision of respirators and vacuum hoses to protect bridge workers from lead poisoning
In 2000 and 2004, Levin's research and testimony helped convict Joseph Thorn and father and son Alexander and Raul Salvagno, owners of asbestos abatement companies in New York. The Salvagnos secretly co-owned a lab that produced 75,000 fraudulent laboratory analysis results on asbestos levels.
Levin was also the primary investigator for a project on Libby, Montana, a mining town where thousands of workers and residents had been exposed to asbestos-contaminated vermiculite ore.
World Trade Center workers
Just days after the World Trade Center attacks, Levin and his colleagues started planning what would become the clinic for WTC responders. Ninety percent of the 10,116 firefighters and other responders reported an acute cough within the first 48 hours, as a study the clinic put out three years later would document. The clinic, which received more than $12 million from the government, has already screened and treated more than 20,000 workers, and released over a dozen studies. One 2006 study showed that approximately 30% of the patients screened suffered from chronic asthma and bronchitis, and 17% suffered from PTSD and depression. Levin was instrumental in passage of the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act. This legislation is designed to ensure that the 911 first responders are provided with basic medical care needed as a result of their toxic exposures.
