Susan Cookson
Emergency Response and Recovery Branch
Biography
Susan Temporado Cookson, MD, MPH has been at CDC since 1995 when she started with the Epidemic Intelligence Service with the now DHQP and then with the Division of Global Migration and Quarantine before joining the Emergency Response and Recovery Branch (ERRB) 10 years ago. There she served as Chief Health Officer for CDC responses to assorted emergencies, was involved with the response to different elements of the Syrian crisis, and was the International Task Force Lead for the CDC’s Zika response in 2016. Her current position is Lead of the Vulnerable Populations Team of the Global TB Branch in the Center for Global Health.
She started her love of TB as a physician out of internship for the ministry of health of Nicaragua in the late 1980s. She has continued to work peripherally in the TB arena, working at the DeKalb County Pulmonary Clinic for ½ day a week for over 15 years. Before her current TB position, she was able to sent her EISO to work with the National TB Program surveillance systems in Lebanon and Jordan. This is a follow-up to the prior work that they conducted after providing technical assistance for developing the TB public health strategy among Syrian refugees in Jordan, bringing TB and emergency response into one project.
She has traveled extensively in Latin America, Africa and Asia working with displaced and refugee populations, developing monitoring and evaluation frameworks for refugee healthcare services and surveillance systems, training young scientists, performing operational research, and responding to disasters, man-made, natural, and infectious. Her expertise is infectious diseases research, including TB, in resource-limited settings. Susan is board certified in Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases, and a specialist in Preventive Medicine. She is also an Adjunct Associate Professor at the Global Health Dept., Rollins School of Public Health, Emory Univ. She has written over 50 peer-review articles.
Areas of Interest
- Disease Surveillance
- Evaluation
- Global Health
- Infecious Disease
- Risk Assessment
Contact Information
CDC1600 Clifton Rd, NE
Atlanta, GA 30333
Education
- MPH, Emory University
- MD, University of North Carolina
- BS, Duke University
Publications
- Gargano LM, Tate JE, Parashar UD, Omer SB, Cookson ST, 2015, Comparison of impact and cost-effectiveness of rotavirus supplementary and routine immunization in a complex humanitarian emergency, Somali case study, Conflict and Health, 9,
- Navarro-Colorado C, Mahamud A, Burton A, Haskew C, Maina G, Wagacha JB, Ahmed JA, Shetty S, Cookson S, Goodson JL, Schilperoord M, Spiegel P. , 2014, Measles outbreak response among adolescent and adult Somali refugees displaced by famine in Kenya and Ethiopia, 2011. , J Infect Dis , ,
- Susan T. Cookson, Antony Ajanga, Marthe Everard, Ghulam R. Popal, Kevin R. Clarke, Farah Husain. , 2013, Success with disease surveillance in Somalia. , British Med J , 347, 21
- Thomson K, Dvorzak JL, Lagu J, Laku R, Dineen B, Schilperood M, Muita M, Gikunju S, Waitboci L, Fields B, Teshale E, Gerbi G, Cookson S, Handzel T, Clarke K. , 2013, Investigation of hepatitis E outbreak among refugees—Upper Nile, South Sudan, 2012–2013, MMWR, ,
- Cookson ST, Abaza H, Clarke KR, Burton A, Sabrah NA, Rumman KA, et al. , 1945, Impact and response to tuberculosis among Syrian refugees in Jordan: Case study of a tuberculosis public health strategy, Conflict and Health , ,