Garrett graduated with honors in biology from the University of California in Santa Cruz. She attended graduate school in the Department of Bacteriology and Immunology at UC Berkeley and did research at Stanford University in the laboratory of Dr. Leonard Herzenberg. During her PhD studies, Garrett started reporting on science news at KPFA, America's first listener-sponsored radio station. The hobby soon became far more interesting than graduate school and she took a leave of absence to explore journalism. Garrett never completed her PhD. At KPFA Garrett worked in management, in news, and in radio documentary production. A documentary series she co-produced with Adi Gevins won the 1977 George Foster Peabody Award in Broadcasting, and other KPFA production efforts by Garrett won the Armstrong and Corporation for Public Broadcasting Awards.

Garrett is currently the Senior Fellow of the Global Health Program at the Council on Foreign Relations. She has worked on a broad variety of issues including SARS, Avian flu, Tuberculosis, Malaria, and the intersection of HIV/AIDS and national security.

Laurie Garrett is the author of the following books:

• The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance (Penguin; 1995) ISBN 0-1402-5091-3
• :discusses the vulnerability of the world to disease due to the lack of attention and funding given to health.
• Betrayal of Trust: The Collapse of Global Public Health (Hyperion; 2001) ISBN 0-7868-8440-1