Janet Hamilton, MPH

Janet Hamilton, MPH, assumed the role of CSTE's Executive Director in April 2020. As Executive Director, Janet works directly with the Executive Board and senior management team to lead and shape CSTE’s mission of advancing the field of applied public health epidemiology in the U.S. Janet received her Master of Public Health in Epidemiology from the University of Michigan and is a graduate of the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) 10 X 10 program. She was a member of CSTE’s Executive Board, serving from 2011 to 2015 as the Surveillance and Informatics Steering Committee Chair and was CSTE President from 2017-2018.

Janet is an epidemiologist with over 15 years of public health work experience at the national, state, local, tribal, and territorial levels overseeing policy development and liaising with CSTE members and strategic partners. She started her career as fellow in the Florida-based Epidemic Intelligence Service with the Florida Department of Health in 2003 where she focused primarily on conducting outbreak investigations. Prior to her selection as Executive Director, Janet served as CSTE’s Senior Director of Science and Policy, leading organizational efforts to strategically combine applied epidemiology science with policy efforts to advance public health and applied epidemiologic public health practice. One focus of her work at CSTE has been to lead public health surveillance data modernization through the “Data: Elemental to Health” campaign, which seeks to secure $1 billion in federal funding over 10 years to support this foundational need.

In her previous role with the Florida Department of Health, Janet played leadership roles in Florida’s response to 2009 H1N1, MERS-CoV, Zika, fungal meningitis, Deep Water Horizon Gulf oil spill, 11 major hurricanes including the 2004 season where the state was impacted by four major storms, the threat of imported Ebola from West Africa in 2014 and other outbreaks and public health events. She oversaw both the design, development and maintenance of the disease/condition surveillance systems themselves, as well as the rules and regulations to support data collection efforts. Additionally, she oversaw Meaningful Use activities for the Florida Department of Health in the areas of electronic laboratory reporting and syndromic surveillance. Her efforts developing and running the Florida Department of Health’s infectious disease surveillance systems made Florida a leader in innovation in both reportable disease and syndromic surveillance.

Janet’s work has been recognized in 2011 with the receipt of the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Davies Award for positively impacting population health by optimizing health information technology. She has also been actively involved in numerous national committees to advance public health surveillance. At CSTE, she continues her work to support effective public health surveillance and sound epidemiologic practice through training, capacity development, and peer consultation.