Funded by a gift from the Robert W. Woodruff Foundation, the Emory COVID-19 Response Collaborative (ECRC) is a group of dedicated public health professionals engaged in practice and research focused COVID-19 activities around the state of Georgia. Housed within the Center for Public Health Preparedness and Research (CPHPR) at the Rollins School of Public Health, ECRC provides flexible and collaborative support to public health partners. Addressing the COVID-19 crisis now and into the future while improving the foundation upon which Georgia’s public health system is built is paramount to this concerted effort.
Leadership
Allison T. Chamberlain, PhD, MS
ECRC Director and Research Associate Professor of Epidemiology, RSPH
ECRC Director and Research Associate Professor of Epidemiology, RSPH
Dean Emeritus and Professor of Epidemiology, RSPH
Commissioner, Georgia Department of Public Health
ECRC Faculty Advisors and Focus Area Leads
Neel Gandhi, MD
Professor of Epidemiology and Global Health, RSPH
Professor of Epidemiology and Global Health, RSPH
An infectious disease epidemiologist with a long career in tuberculosis prevention, Dr. Neel Gandhi is a professor of epidemiology at the Rollins School of Public Health. He has been working closely with the epidemiology division of the Fulton County Board of Health (FCBOH) since April 2020. Dr. Gandhi’s efforts with FCBOH have centered around leading a team of Emory students and FCBOH staff that collaborates to conduct COVID-19 case investigations and produce publicly available COVID-19 epidemiology reports that can be found here.
Sarita Shah, MD, MPH
Associate Professor of Global Health and Epidemiology, RSPH
Associate Professor of Global Health and Epidemiology, RSPH
Dr. Sarita Shah is an associate professor of global health with a joint appointment in epidemiology at the Rollins School of Public Health. With research interests in tuberculosis (TB) and HIV, Dr. Shah’s experience working in a variety of countries to optimize methods of TB screening and understand household transmission has made her a valuable asset to the local COVID-19 response. Dr. Shah works closely with the Fulton County Board of Health’s epidemiology division to guide data analytics on topics like nursing home outbreaks and risk factors for severe COVID-19 outcomes.
Research Professor of Epidemiology, RSPH
Dr. Jodie Guest leads ECRC outbreak response activities. As a professor and vice chair of the RSPH Department of Epidemiology, Jodie is passionate about community engaged research and learning. When not teaching epidemiology to RSPH students, Dr. Guest spends much of her time organizing pop-up COVID-19 testing events across Georgia. To date, she has held testing and community outreach events in Hall County, Georgia, the City of Milledgeville, and at Atlanta’s Mexican Consultate.
Shivani Patel, PhD, MPH
Assistant Professor of Global Health and Epidemiology, RSPH
Assistant Professor of Global Health and Epidemiology, RSPH
Shivani A. Patel is a social epidemiologist and is currently an Assistant Professor in the Hubert Department of Global Health. Her research is guided by an overarching interest in describing and understanding disparities in cardio-metabolic disease morbidity and mortality globally, with particular focus on South Asia. To that end, she investigates the role of ethnic background, contextual factors (such as historical undernutrition, urbanization, migration, geography), and early life disadvantage in influencing cardio-metabolic disease profiles.Since Spring 2020, she has lead projects in collaboration with the Georgia Department of Public Health including COVID-19 inequities & underlying conditions and geospatial analyses.
Patrick Sullivan, DVM, PhD
Charles Howard Candler Professor of Epidemiology and Global Health, RSPH
Charles Howard Candler Professor of Epidemiology and Global Health, RSPH
Dr. Patrick Sullivan is the Charles Howard Candler Professor of Epidemiology at the Rollins School of Public Health. A highly accomplished HIV/AIDS researcher, Dr. Sullivan has experience in epidemiology, behavioral health, health disparities, and intervention evaluation. Dr. Sullivan is leading a national NIH-funded study called COVIDVu to more thoroughly characterize the COVID epidemic in the United States. He is working closely with Dr. Aaron Siegler on a Georgia-specific household survey to characterize the impact COVID-19 has had on Georgia residents.
Aaron Siegler, PhD
Associate Professor of Behavioral, Social, Health Education and Epidemiology, RSPH
Associate Professor of Behavioral, Social, Health Education and Epidemiology, RSPH
Dr. Aaron Siegler is an associate professor of Epidemiology at the Emory Rollins School of Public Health. With expertise in HIV/AIDS, much of Dr. Siegler’s research focuses on improving access to HIV prevention and care through a deep understanding of both epidemiology and behavioral science. Currently, he is co-leading a national NIH-funded study called COVIDVu to characterize the COVID-19 epidemic in the United States. The ECRC is supporting his efforts on a similar study specific to Georgia through a statewide household survey.
Hannah Cooper, ScD
Professor of Behavioral, Social, Health Education and Epidemiology, RSPH
Professor of Behavioral, Social, Health Education and Epidemiology, RSPH
Dr. Hannah Cooper is a professor of behavioral, social, and health education sciences at the Emory Rollins School of Public Health. Passionate about social determinants of drug-related harms, Dr. Cooper holds the Rollins Chair of Substance Use Disorders Research. Early after COVID-19 emerged, Dr. Cooper leveraged her close working relationship with the Georgia Department of Public Health to organize groups of RSPH faculty interested in lending support to the state’s response. Since Spring 2020, she has helped shepherd numerous projects on topics including COVID-19 transmission dynamics, inequities & underlying conditions, and geospatial analyses.
Administration
Director of Administration and Operations, ECRC
Director, Rollins Epidemiology Fellowship
Public Health Program Associate