Data and Creativity Help Meet Audiences Where They Are

Education

I grew up in Atlanta, received a BA in Spanish and Health Sciences from Clemson University in 2006, and earned an MPH in 2014 at San Francisco State University.

In 2023, after I was already working at CDC, I earned a DrPh from the Georgia State University School of Public Health. My dissertation was about the intersection of disability health disparities and digital accessibility. This topic is central to inclusive digital design and compliance with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act.

Job Prior to CDC

I worked with a mobile health clinic in Guatemala.

First CDC Job

I started as a contractor with CDC’s birth defects and developmental disabilities unit in 2016. Our charge was to ensure children's needs are included at every phase of planning for and responding to disasters, with emphasis on children with disabilities and special healthcare needs—a population that is particularly vulnerable during public health emergencies. While assigned to work on children’s preparedness, I deployed to CDC’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC) for responses to the Flint, MI water crisis, multiple Hurricanes (Matthew in 2016; Harvey, Irma, Maria in 2017; and Florence in 2018), and the Zika virus outbreak, each time to address children’s public health needs.

My team developed educational books for children, put them online, and distributed over 200,000 print copies throughout the U.S. and its territories. Often featuring Ready Wrigley, a caped safety-crusader cartoon dog, the books contained puzzles and exercises that help families with children prepare for emergencies by staying informed, packing an emergency kit, and having an emergency communication plan. The materials also helped children talk about their feelings and learn positive ways to express their emotions in uncertain times. Scenarios included earthquakes and other disasters, as well as more common threats such as mosquito-borne illnesses, water contamination, flooding and mold remediation. We also collaborated with state health departments to facilitate preparedness exercises to improve communication and collaboration in future pediatric emergencies.

Later Jobs at CDC

Eager to apply my communication skills to a new public health topic area, I accepted another contract position as a health communication specialist with CDC/ATSDR’s Geospatial Research program, where I stayed from late 2018 through 2020. I worked with some brilliant geospatial epidemiologists to launch a data repository for improved decision-making in emergencies and expand the agency’s geospatial community of practice. The highly-collaborative team provided technical assistance across CDC. For example, we worked with the vessel sanitation program to model a norovirus outbreak on a cruise ship and, from that experience, we developed a public-facing educational video about geospatial science.

As the COVID-19 outbreak was rapidly expanding in 2020, I competed successfully for a full-time, permanent CDC position, and joined the communication unit of the minority health and health equity office. The office included the first-ever Chief Health Equity Officer (CHEO) to be part of CDC’s emergency response structure. I co-led national campaigns for vaccine equity, and helped to ensure that the needs of communities at increased risk for COVID-19 were addressed using culturally/linguistically appropriate approaches. I also played an instrumental role in an ethnic media coalition contract to produce a tour that promoted the COVID-19 vaccine across 650 racial/ethnic minority radio stations, reaching 1.8 million listeners.

Final CDC Job

My team was working on a data-driven framework to communicate with different audiences about how health equity impacts everyone. The research question was how public health officials could avoid certain terms like “racism” or “inclusion” that some audiences resist and still explain how those concepts impact our health. We conducted message testing to inform both the framework and an interactive training, which we delivered to 3,500 federal and state health agency staff members. The training was effective in helping public health officials communicate about health needs in a way that met diverse audiences where they were, communicated health equity as a “we” issue, and framed health equity as achievable—without using hot-button language that could derail their efforts.

I was also leading a steering committee to build agency-wide capacity to implement and evaluate a new Language Access Policy and Plan, both of which were congressionally mandated in Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The legislation required us to enhance infrastructure for communicating with people with limited English proficiency and those with communication disabilities. We established a council with representatives from each CDC Center to respond by March to an HHS call for data on strategies to support language access.

My Proudest Achievement

One thing that stands out is my experience serving on many different emergency responses. At the federal level, we’re usually somewhat removed from face-to-face interactions with different communities, and it was good to feel closer to those communities whose members were impacted by my work. I often saw lives change in real time, which can be less common in our field. It’s hard to fully appreciate what didn’t happen as a result of effective prevention (e.g., how many children didn’t die from measles because they received a vaccine, or how many people didn’t get lung cancer because of successful smoking cessation campaigns).

But I was most proud of the work we were doing to show the connection between social determinants of health and health equity.

Leaving CDC

Although the minority and women’s health offices are codified in the Affordable Care Act, and therefore congressionally mandated, our entire program of nearly 40 professionals was abolished. All work came to an abrupt and indefinite pause with little clarity regarding when or if the work would continue. A few USPHS officers and fellows under different funding mechanisms remained to shut down the office and quickly organize and archive our 35+ years of important work. The CHEO Unit was intended to be activated for all subsequent emergency responses (e.g., mpox) but, given the termination of the entire Office, I don’t know what will happen.

I received 3 different RIF notices from HHS HR (rather than HR at CDC). The notices came via email on April 1 (at 5am) for RIF dates of June 2 and June 30, and then a third RIF notice arrived on May 2 for a July 2 RIF date. Given that a substantial percentage of the CDC HR staff were also impacted by the RIF, it has been challenging to get any clarification from either CDC HR or HHS HR. Each day still feels like mass chaos because we cannot get clear and official answers. The reason given for my dismissal was not poor performance. Instead, it was a broader reorganization strategy to improve HHS’ efficiency and effectiveness, and make America healthier. Many of our letters included incorrect performance scores and other inaccurate information.

To be called lazy and wasteful lunatics and terminated in the name of efficiency from an administration that has been anything but efficient was a tough pill to swallow. It’s painfully clear how oblivious the Department’s current leadership is to CDC’s mission and the field of public health in general.

This has been emotional torture since early January, nothing is set in stone, and I have a feeling the PTSD will remain for a long time for many of us—including those still at the agency. What keeps me up at night is the fact that people are dying and will continue to die as a direct result of this administration’s irresponsible and dangerous decisions. The duration of chaos is not just a 4-year presidential term; the ripple effect of what is happening in this moment will be incredibly detrimental for decades to come, from every angle (i.e., public health, health care, social, structural, economic, environmental), and for all Americans—even those who continue to praise the recklessness.

Future Plans  

I’m trying to reframe this nightmare as an opportunity to apply my expertise in health equity communication science to needs in the private sector. I’ve applied for approximately 60 jobs since January, spending 6-8 hours almost daily on applications and networking to no end, but I’ve gotten only one interview so far. Perhaps it’s because so many civil servants are suddenly out of work and the competition is even greater? Perhaps the job market is becoming more reflective of our weakening economy? Or maybe it’s something else? All I know is there are too many experts with advanced degrees, decades of experience, and a drive to make the world a better place, who have been illegally terminated, unethically silenced, and/or forced to spend their time searching scientific literature for data to support the HHS Director’s egregious claims and severely flawed treatment protocols, flagrant misinterpretations of research, and completely made-up studies. In addition to this country quickly becoming an embarrassment in the global public health arena, the repercussions of this administration’s decisions on communities who have been historically marginalized, under-resourced, and medically underserved will be detrimental. I’m afraid of what the agency will become under this administration, and right now, I can’t think of a realistic scenario in which I would go back.

Other Comments

I was so proud to work with incredibly dedicated and competent people at CDC – I worked with geniuses!  They had incredible commitment to the public health mission. I never met anyone for whom it was, oh, just a job. And working closely with CDC leaders taught me so much about effective leadership styles. It was an honor serving my country in this capacity, and I was proud of everything I worked on across my CDC roles.