CONTACT TRACING
CAREER OUTLOOK NOW HIRING: 300,000 CONTACT TRACERS When Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), spoke with NPR in early April, he said his agency is working on a plan to safely reopen the United States. According to Redfield, the initiative will involve ramped-up testing, and, “very aggressive” contact tracing to “block and tackle.” A
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Contact Tracing: Fighting the COVID-19 Pandemic
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Contact Tracing: America Needs ‘An Army of 300,000 People’
Washington D.C.-based group, which aims to help agencies expand contact tracing teams, has called contact tracing the largest civilian mobilization since World War II. In this edition of Career Outlook, we look at why the CDC is asking America to train a large contact tracer workforce, and why one former CDC director said state and local public health departments need to hire 300,000 people from the ranks of “college graduates, people working at social service agencies, social workers, child health workers, and people doing Meals on Wheels.”
CAREER OUTLOOK CONTACT TRACING: FIGHTING THE
COVID-19
PANDEMIC
A recent report has found disease outbreaks present a major challenge to global health. Domesticated animals, primates, and bats were identified as having more zoonotic viruses than other species. On May 1, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) posted that there had been more than a million COVID-19 cases and 62,406 deaths. More than 20 states reported over 10,000 cases of COVID-19. They included Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Illinois, Michigan, and California. According to the demographic characteristics of COVID-19 cases in the United States, the CDC said more than 17,000 cases were of young people less than 18. A total of 283,190 people were between 18 and 44 years old, 279,653 were aged 45–64, 87,403 were 65–74, and more than 98,000 were 75 or older.
COVID-19 Testing Technologies and Vaccines As of April 30, the CDC said the total number of public health laboratories that have completed verification and are offering testing was 97.
A national poll conducted by NBC Washington from March 24 to March 25, 2020 among a sample of 2,200 adults said only 30 percent of adults would 42
be among the first to vaccinate for the COVID-19 coronavirus if it became available. About 30 percent also said they strongly agreed that if the vaccine was to become available, all Americans should be required to receive the vaccine, and it should be free.
scientists and their collaborators at the biotechnology company Moderna, Inc., based in Cambridge, MA. The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) supported the manufacturing of the vaccine candidate for the Phase 1 clinical trial.
In March, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, said a Phase 1 clinical trial evaluating an investigational vaccine designed to protect against coronavirus disease 2019 has begun at Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute (KPWHRI) in Seattle, WA.
By mid-April, the National Institutes of Health announced a new initiative aimed at speeding innovation, development, and commercialization of COVID-19 testing technologies. The medical research agency said it was a pivotal component needed to return to normal during this unprecedented global pandemic.
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health, is funding the trial. KPWHRI is part of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’ Clinical Research Consortium. The open-label trial enrolled 45 healthy adult volunteers ages 18 to 55 years over approximately six weeks. The first participant received the investigational vaccine in May. The study is evaluating different doses of the experimental vaccine for safety and its ability to induce an immune response in participants. This is the first of multiple steps in the clinical trial process for evaluating the potential benefit of the vaccine. The vaccine is called mRNA1273 and was developed by NIAID
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With a $1.5 billion investment from federal stimulus funding, the newly launched Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics initiative will infuse funding into early innovative technologies to speed development of rapid and widely accessible COVID-19 testing. At the same time, NIH will seek opportunities to move more advanced diagnostic technologies swiftly through the development pipeline toward commercialization and broad availability. NIH said it will work closely with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority to advance these goals.
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INDUSTRY OVERVIEW With scientists still learning about the virus, Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), said a second wave of the novel coronavirus is “inevitable,” the same day the United States topped 1 million cases of COVID-19. The nation’s leading epidemiologist said in an interview with the Economic Club that the virus probably won’t go away due to how contagious it is and its reach around the world.
Contact Tracing
At the end of April, the CDC published a document on its website called “Contact Tracing : Part of a Multipronged Approach to Fight the COVID-19 Pandemic,” and in the report, the CDC highlighted the basic principles of contact tracing to stop COVID-19 transmission. According to the CDC, contact tracing has been used for decades. It is a core disease control measure employed by local and state health department personnel and will be a key strategy for preventing further spread of COVID-19. A Washington, D.C.-based group that aims to help agencies expand contact tracing teams has called contact tracing the largest civilian mobilization since World War II. The CDC recommended that communities across America scale up and train a large contact tracer workforce that will work together across public and private agencies to stop the transmission of COVID-19. The CDC also said staffing resources must be expanded to stop the transmission of COVID-19. Contact tracing in the U.S. will require that states, tribes, localities, and territories establish large cadres of contact tracers, the CDC said. With contact tracing jobs in high demand, Career Outlook will discuss what contact tracing is and the specialized skills the job requires. S
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CAREER OUTLOOK
Contact Tracing:
America Needs ‘an Army of 300,000 People’ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Robert Redfield has called for “substantial expansion of public health fieldworkers” to undertake aggressive contact tracing. He called the campaign “block and tackle.” Other experts have said state and local governments will have to train people and have a system that works. In this section, we look at where contact tracing jobs will be, what employment options will look like for people entering this field, skills/focus areas/majors/trades people will need to have/acquire in order to obtain these jobs, and starting salaries.
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JOB HORIZON
F
ormer CDC director Tom Frieden told STAT that America needs “an army of 300,000 people.”
STAT is a magazine focused on health, medicine, life sciences, and the business of making medicines. It provides insights on changes in the life science industry. During the last week of April, the New York City mayor’s office, in partnership with a nonprofit organization dedicated to the advancement of the health and well-being of all New Yorkers, announced new contact tracer positions. The City was looking to hire 1,000 people by the end of May with an immediate start date. On May 1, Ventris Gibson, director of the Washington, D.C. Department of Human Resources, said that its 900 Contact Trace Force jobs involve speaking remotely with those who have had the virus and others who have come into close contact with those who have had it. Various job advertisements for contact tracers have called for candidates with a least a four-year high school diploma or its educational equivalent approved by a state’s Department of Education. Across the country, contact tracer job advertisements called for people with public health backgrounds to investigate and trace COVID-19 cases and contacts. According to the scope of work, job requirements, salary, benefits, and application guidelines for New York, candidates with health-related professional experience or public health training were preferred. By April 28, the Saint Louis County Department of Public Health, which was hiring, training, and supervising a contact tracing team across St. Louis County in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, had stopped accepting applications. With a projected 300,000 contact tracer jobs available, we took a look at what contact tracers do in public health systems around the country. Contact tracers trace and monitor contacts of infected people. Many make calls from call centers to conduct phone interviews with people diagnosed with COVID-19. Contact tracers gather information about a case, elicit the
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case’s contacts, notify and educate any household/close contacts who are present during the interview, and assess case and household contact needs for services to support isolation/quarantine, including medical care. The CDC notes that contact tracing is a specialized skill. It requires people with training, supervision, and access to social and medical support for patients and contacts. The CDC says that requisite knowledge and skills for contact tracers include understanding the medical terms and principles of exposure, infection, infectious period, potentially infectious interactions, symptoms of disease, pre-symptomatic and asymptomatic infection, and most importantly, understanding patient confidentiality.
With a projected 300,000 contact tracer jobs available, we took a look at what contact tracers do in public health systems around the country. According to the CDC, six skills that contact tracers need are:
• Ability to conduct interviews without violating confidentiality (e.g., to those who might overhear their conversations) • Excellent interpersonal, cultural sensitivity, and interviewing skills such that they can build and maintain trust with patients and contacts • Basic skills of crisis counseling, and the ability to confidently refer patients and contacts for further care, if needed • Resourcefulness in locating patients and contacts who may be difficult to reach or reluctant to engage in conversation
• Understanding of when to refer
individuals or situations to medical, social, or supervisory resources • Cultural competency appropriate to the local community Candidates for supervisory contact tracer positions were required to have a baccalaureate degree from an accredited college or university, and two years of full-time satisfactory experience in a public health program, or an associate degree from an accredited college or university, including or supplemented by 12 semester credits in health education or health, social, or biological sciences; and four years of experience. The salary for this position was $65,000. In New York, job advertisements required:
• Public health experience and training • Experience supervising diverse teams
• Experience working with different communication styles
• Ability to be respectful, sensitive to,
and understanding of the diverse perspectives of staff and work with them to resolve differences • Ability to understand the concepts of institutional and structural racism and bias and their impact on underserved and underrepresented communities • Excellent interpersonal skills and the ability to interact professionally with people from diverse cultural, racial, ethnic, gender, and socioeconomic backgrounds during a time of crisis and distress In addition, candidates were required to show a commitment to supporting communities who have experienced systemic oppression and bias (e.g. people of color, LGBTQ+ people, and immigrants). The World Health Organization says people who closely watch contacts after exposure to an infected person, help the contacts to get care and treatment, and prevent further transmission of the virus perform a monitoring process called contact tracing, which can be broken down into three basic steps:
1. Contact identification 2. Contact listing 3. Contact follow-up S
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CAREER OUTLOOK
Now hiring
Contact Tracers
with Public Health Experience
A paper
published by the National Center for Biotechnology Information called ”Contact tracing to control infectious disease: when enough is enough” said contact tracing (also known as partner notification) has been the primary means of controlling infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Beyond the primary means
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of controlling infection, you have the second and third line of defense in public health. That’s where people like William Carter Jenkins come in. He passed away in 2019, but Jenkins spent much of his career working to expand the ranks of minorities in a field that works to control infectious disease and reduce environmental hazards. Jenkins and the other professionals
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you will read about in People to Know work in a variety of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields in epidemiology. Epidemiologists monitor the spread of diseases and work to understand their causes and develop solutions. The Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health (ASPPH), a membership organization located in Washington, D.C., has listed about 10 common areas of study in epidemiology. www.blackengineer.com
PEOPLE TO KNOW by Lango Deen ldeen@ccgmag.com
They include biostatisticians and informatics professionals who collect and analyze hard data, and community health specialists whose work involves the many social, political, and biological issues that influence the overall health of a community or region. William C. Jenkins, commonly known as Bill Jenkins, received a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Morehouse College in 1967 and became one of the first Black Americans recruited www.blackengineer.com
to the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps. After earning a master’s degree in biostatistics from Georgetown University in 1974, he went on to receive a master’s in public health in 1977 and a doctorate in epidemiology in 1983, both from the University of North Carolina. While working as a professor at Morehouse, he established a Master of Public Health program and partnered with the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to form a summer internship designed to boost the public health skills of minority students. It’s said he once estimated that more than half of the African Americans with a doctorate in epidemiology had been trained through the program and related activities. In his obituary, his wife, a former epidemiologist at the CDC and public health professor at the University of North Carolina, said, “He was always
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CAREER OUTLOOK a stalwart in making sure the research he was involved in was highly ethical.” She added that “he got involved several times at CDC in objecting to planned studies, trying to make sure a study was not started, or was revised to the point where it would have a better, ethical approach.” Jenkins was also part of a group of historians, bioethicists, and health professionals. He taught epidemiology at the University of North Carolina, helping found an annual minority health conference at the school, and established the Society for the Analysis of African American Public Health Issues, an affiliate of the American Public Health Association. According to American Job Centers, funded by the Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration, and CareerOneStop, sponsored by the Department of Labor, new job opportunities are likely for epidemiologists. MPH Online says the epidemiologist job outlook on a national level is positive. Quoting the Bureau of Labor Statistics, MPH Online said that roughly 34 percent of all jobs in the field are in state government. There are also opportunities working for a city or town. Many epidemiologists work for the federal government, in agencies like the CDC or the Department of Health and Human Services.
What do epidemiologists do?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics describes epidemiologists as medical detectives—searching for clues to determine how and why people get sick. According to the CareerOneStop blog, they look for patterns of disease in human populations and develop ways to prevent and control outbreaks. They collect data in many forms and present their findings to government groups and the public. Like any detective, an epidemiologist must sometimes go on location to find out more about the cause and effect of a disease in a community. They may conduct interviews to identify who is at most risk and develop explanations for how a disease is spread. They often publish important findings in medical journals, which may lead to beneficial new public health 48
programs.
Where do epidemiologists work?
Most work for government agencies such as the CDC, or state health departments. Epidemiologists also work at universities, hospitals, research facilities, and pharmaceutical companies. They may specialize in areas such as environmental epidemiology, emergency preparedness, or chronic diseases. Public Health Online, which began in early 2014 to provide students, parents, and readers with information about health topics and careers, says the job duties of an epidemiologist revolve around gathering medical and health information from the field, research or historical data, analyzing the data collected, and presenting the findings. Those findings can then be used to discover how diseases originate, spread, and can be treated. Public Health Online said even though many diseases are no longer harming humanity the way they used to, epidemiologists are still important today. However, the specific day-to-day job duties of an epidemiologist differ depending on the organization they work for and whether they primarily focus on research or the application of research to public health issues. People who investigate and describe the distribution of disease and develop the means for prevention and control have different job titles, Career One Stop says on its website. These include nurse epidemiologist, public health epidemiologist, research epidemiologist, state epidemiologist, communicable disease specialist, infection control practitioner (ICP), chronic disease epidemiologist, epidemiology investigator, epidemiologist, and environmental epidemiologist. CareerOneStop found that 50 percent of workers in this field have a Ph.D. or doctoral or professional degree, 24 percent have master’s degrees, and another 24 percent hold a bachelor’s degree. Only 1 percent of the workforce have associate degrees. MPH Online, an online resource for public health students, says when it comes to a career
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in epidemiology, you do not need to obtain a Ph.D. to start. You can start in your career with a master’s degree or master’s degree in public health to work in a lab, government agency, or a similar role. Some states require an occupational license to work in this field.
People to Know
Rao Uppu is the James and Ruth Endowed Professor of Environmental Toxicology in the College of Sciences and Engineering at Southern University Baton Rouge (SUBR). Uppu attributes his success to his more than 20 years of research in chemical/ molecular toxicology and over five years of field research experience in molecular epidemiology. Uppu has been adjudicator for several Ph.D./DSc theses. In 2007, Uppu was honored as the university-wide researcher and professor of the year. He also received SUBR’s Business and Industry Cluster Quality Award (2011), Telugu Association of North America Excellence in Science Award (2011), SUBR Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching (2013), and the Becoming Everything You Are (BEYA) Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Innovators Award. Crystal M. James is head of the Department of Graduate Public Health at Tuskegee University in Tuskegee, AL. She is also director of the public health program and associate professor of graduate public health. James is a 1994 biology graduate from Clark Atlanta University. She earned a JD from the University of Houston Law in 1998 and a Master of Public Health from Emory University Environmental & Occupational Health in 1996. Her research interests are public health law and legal intervention. Dr. Wayne H. Giles became the dean of the School of Public Health at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) in 2017. UIC is the only fully accredited school of public health in the state of Illinois. Prior to joining UIC, he spent 25 years at the CDC. His portfolio at the CDC included running activities in community health promotion, aging, school health, and racial and ethnic www.blackengineer.com
PEOPLE TO KNOW
TOP
Pharmacy Chains
CVS Pharmacy Walgreens Walmart Stores Inc. Rite Aid Corporation Cardinal Health Inc.
Average Salaries for Epidemiologists
(Source: 15 BEST JOBS IN EPIDEMIOLOGY MPH Online, epidemiology-careers)
» Average salary for a research epidemiologist is around $90,500 per year. » Average salary for an epidemiologist working in a government position is around $69,600 per year.
» A climate health epidemiologist earns an average salary of roughly $50,000 per year. » The salary for an epidemiologist in clinical trial research is around $70,000 per year. » A disaster epidemiologist, who investigates the effects of a disaster on a population’s health, can expect a salary of roughly $70,000 per year.
» A salary for an epidemiology investigator, who identifies the cause of a disease or
addresses the risk factors associated with a condition, averages around $75,000 per year, though starting salaries are slightly lower than average at roughly $40,000 per year.
disparities in health. He has been the recipient of numerous awards including the CDC’s Charles C. Shepard Award in Assessment and Epidemiology. Giles earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Washington University, a master’s degree in epidemiology from the University of Maryland, and an MD from Washington University. Kim Dobson Sydnor, Ph.D. is currently dean of the School of Community Health and Policy at Morgan State University and serves as associate professor for the Department of Behavioral Health Sciences. In addition, Sydnor is the site director for the W.K. Kellogg Community Health Scholars program—the communitybased participatory research track. Sydnor’s research is broadly interested in the social determinants of health, which are those conditions and circumstances that shape both the behavior and health status of individuals and communities. In addition to her teaching, research, and administrative roles, Sydnor helps to build the next generation of public health leaders as a mentor and an active member of the Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society. In April 2014, Sally S. Cherry celebrated her 40th year in laboratory science and was featured in the American Society for Clinical Pathology ONE Lab News for 2014 Medical Laboratory Professionals’ Week. Cherry’s professional training and experience includes service as a city health laboratory coordinator, international GTI consultant, national training laboratory instructor, and www.blackengineer.com
» An epidemiology manager or administrator takes on a leadership role within a
medical facility or an institution and may need a higher level of education than the average epidemiologist.
» An epidemiology professor can expect to make an average of $64,000 per year. » A field epidemiologist can expect to earn around $68,000 per year. » A hospital epidemiologist makes an average income of around $69,600 per year. » The average salary for an infection preventionist or infection control epidemiologist is around $98,000 per year.
» A molecular epidemiologist can expect a median salary of roughly $69,600 per year. » The role of a pharmaceutical epidemiologist is to work with pharmaceutical
companies to make decisions about the drugs developed for the population. A pharmaceutical epidemiologist makes an average salary of roughly $69,000 per year.
STD/STI lab consultant. After several years as a medical technologist at Union Memorial Hospital, Cherry worked at the Baltimore City Health Department—Bureau of Disease Control as the laboratory coordinator. This position led to a career opportunity related to medical laboratory training. As a laboratory consultant, STI laboratory instructor, American Society for Clinical Pathology member, and ASCP-certified medical technologist, Cherry is passionate about the integration of 3D virtual worlds technology into real-life laboratory and health programs to enhance training and awareness. Dr. Allen Bennett is president and CEO of Park West Health Systems (PWHS) located in Northwest Baltimore. Bennett has been with PWHS for more than 30 years. He is a graduate of Howard University
College of Pharmacy and the University of Illinois, School of Public Health. For nearly 50 years, the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health has strengthened public health outcomes and interrupted social and economic disparities in communities. The school has prepared public health practitioners, researchers, academic faculty, policymakers, and activists whose work focuses on positively shaping health outcomes. Dr. Patricia Bennett has over 24 years of experience in health care. She earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Morgan State University, followed by a master’s degree in biology from Atlanta University. Bennett received her doctorate of podiatric medicine from the New York College of Podiatric Medicine. Her background includes clinical research and public health. Bennett is a long-term member of
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CAREER OUTLOOK CDC’s National Diabetes Education Program with experience as a national lecturer on the medical and surgical complications of the diabetic foot. Dr. Charles Brown is assistant professor at Tennessee State University. His areas of expertise are communitybased behavioral health programs and services. A 2001 biology graduate from Tennessee State University, he earned his Ph.D. in 2005 at Middle Tennessee State University after earning a M.Ed. from Belmont University in 2002. He teaches principles of public health education at the graduate level and undergraduate courses in healthcare research methods, trends and issues in healthcare, introduction of healthcare organization, health promotion and disease prevention, consumer health, and ethics and professionalism for health professionals. Brown’s primary research interests include conducting formative and summative evaluations in the area of behavioral health, specifically focusing on substance abuse, mental health, and HIV/AIDS prevention among individuals residing in urban and rural communities. Dr. Mathilde (Matty) Knight, currently an associate professor of biology in the Division of Sciences and Mathematics within the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of the District of Columbia, was recognized at the 2019 Women of Color STEM Conference for her contributions to science with the Outstanding
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Professional Leadership Award. Dr. Knight has worked on schistosomiasisrelated research since 1982. She established a molecular biology laboratory at a nonprofit research institute dedicated to researching neglected tropical diseases, particularly schistosomiasis. Her laboratoryinitiated studies that successfully described genetic variations between parasite resistant and susceptible snails. Her more recent research interest is enabling researchers to dissect mechanisms that can be disrupted to block the parasite’s development in the snail host.
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University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health
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University of Washington School Of Public Health
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University of North Carolina Gillings School of Global Public Health
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UCLA Fielding School of Public Health
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George Washington University—Milken Institute School of Public Health
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Harvard University Chan School of Public Health
Dr. Jemal Gishe is an assistant professor at Tennessee State University. His areas of expertise are biostatistics, epidemiology, research methods, and mathematics. Courses he has taught at the graduate level include principles of epidemiology, biostatistics, and real analysis. His undergraduate courses include health promotion and disease prevention and advanced engineering mathematics. Gisha has expertise, experience, and interest in applications of statistical methodologies: categorical, survival, and longitudinal data analysis; exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis; and generalized linear mixed models. He collaborates in the area of public health, agriculture, sports, and nutrition and has an interest in health disparity studies, prostate cancer, obesity, and community-driven interventions. As a biostatistician, he has experience working in the area of clinical trials for Momentum, a contract research organization.
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University of Illinois at Chicago’s College of Applied Health Sciences at UIC
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Emory University—Rollins School of Public Health
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Columbia University—Mailman School of Public Health
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University of South Florida
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The University of Iowa College of Public Health
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Johns Hopkins University—Bloomberg School of Public Health
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Yale University
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University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health
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The University at Albany—School of Public Health
In 2019, MPH Online, which focuses on public health programs across the country, put together its top programs for 2019. Its rankings are based on programs it found provided quality, affordability, and opportunity.
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UT Health Science Center at Houston
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University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Public Health
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Boston University -Master of public health programs focus on: Biostatistics Epidemiology Health policy and management Population or community health S
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University of Minnesota Texas A&M University Health Science Center
USF College of Public Health University of Michigan The University of Maryland, College Park
Saint Louis University—College of Public Health and Social Justice
University of Massachusetts, Amherst Drexel University—Dornsife School of Public Health
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