Scientific Committee

Chair and Co-Chair

Sevgi Aral (Chair), PhD, MS, MA, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the Associate Director for Science in the Division of STD Prevention, Centers for Disease Control since 1993.  She holds Professorial appointments at the University of Washington in Seattle; University of Manitoba in Winnipeg; and Emory University in Atlanta.  Dr. Aral has authored more than 250 scientific articles and edited 17 journal issues and 3 books.  She has served on many national and international work groups, boards and committees; and has consulted for the World Health Organization, the European Union and the World Bank.  She has also received the ASTDA Achievement Award and the Thomas Parran Award.  Dr. Aral’s research interests have included social and behavioral aspects of sexually transmitted disease, epidemiology and prevention; including gender, age and race effects; mixing patterns; sexual and social networks; contextual factors; social determinants and most recently, program science.

Jami Leichliter (Co-Chair), PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the deputy associate director for science in the Division of STD Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  Dr. Leichliter received her PhD in applied experimental psychology from Southern Illinois University (SIU) with a specialization in measurement and evaluation in public health.  She joined CDC in 1999 after serving as an associate scientist at SIU working on research related to drug and alcohol use on college campuses and the accreditation of the SIU student health program.  In her current position, she oversees division human subjects research issues and assists with division-wide scientific issues.  Her current research interests focus on safety net sexual health services, sexual behavior, the public infrastructure for STD prevention and policy research.  She has engaged in projects focusing on social and behavior issues, evaluation, behavioral surveillance and health services research. She prefers a multidisciplinary approach to current issues in STD prevention.

Track Committees

Assessment Committee

Preeti Pathela (Co-Chair), DrPH, MPH, New York City Department of Health & Mental Hygiene has been with the New York City (NYC) Department of Health and Mental Hygiene’s Bureau of Sexually Transmitted Infections for 15 years. As the Director of Research and Evaluation, she oversees a unit that examines data on STI/HIV patterns among the program’s sexual health clinic population as well as at the citywide level, to develop and answer research questions around local STI/HIV risk and prevention. She leads/consults on analyses of both NYC and multi-jurisdictional data that have been used to guide programmatic action, as well as for contribution to the scientific literature. Preeti received her DrPH degree in Epidemiology from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and her MPH from Emory University.

Hillard Weinstock (Co-Chair), MD, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the chief of the Surveillance and Data Management Branch in the Division of STD Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. After medical training in internal medicine, he completed a fellowship in the Epidemic Intelligence Service at CDC and received an M.P.H. in epidemiology. During his years at CDC, including 12 years as Lead for STD Surveillance and Special Studies Team, he has worked at the state, local, and federal levels, acquired expertise in the surveillance of bacterial and viral STDs, including surveillance for anti-bacterial and antiretroviral drug resistance, worked to improve a variety of surveillance systems, and helped to build new systems critical for monitoring new and emerging STD/HIV syndromes and behaviors. He is the author or co-author of over 150 peer reviewed publications and government reports, mostly related to STD or HIV surveillance.
 

Members

Jeremy Grey, MD, PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention l Robin Hennessy, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Roxanne Kerani, PhD, MPH, University of Washington received her PhD in Epidemiology from the University of Minnesota, and completed postdoctoral training at the University of Washington Center for AIDS and STD.  She is currently Research Assistant Professor in the Division of Allergy and Infectious Disease at the University of Washington and has a longstanding affiliation with Public Health – Seattle and King County HIV/STD Program.  Dr. Kerani’s research interests center around HIV and STD epidemiology, particularly the epidemiology of HIV in immigrants and refugees in the U.S., and STD surveillance and partner services.

Ryan Murphy, PhD, MPH, California Department of Public Health l Trang Nguyen, PhD, MPH, San Francisco Department of Public Health

Alejandro Pérez, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is a Health Scientist in the Division of STD Prevention.  Alejandro has worked at the CDC for ten years and joined the Division in 2018, focusing primarily on issues related to data science and surveillance.

Assurance Committee

Laura Bachmann (Co-Chair), MD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is Chief Medical Officer of the CDC Division of STD Prevention and Clinical Team Lead in the Program Development and Quality Improvement Branch.  Prior to coming to CDC, Dr. Bachmann was a Professor of Medicine at Wake Forest University Health Sciences (Winston-Salem, NC) and Medical Director, Guilford County Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Division (NC).  Dr. Bachmann was the Co-Director of the CDC-funded Alabama/North Carolina STD Prevention Training Center and has been involved in training healthcare providers for over 20 years.  Boarded in Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Bachmann specializes in STD and HIV care with experience practicing in academic and public health settings. She is an expert in the diagnosis and management of STDs, including HIV and she has performed research addressing a variety of STD/HIV control issues in both clinical and non-clinical settings.

Susan Philip (Co-Chair), MD, MPH, San Francisco Department of Public Health is a Deputy Health Officer and the Director of the Disease Control and Prevention branch in the Population Health Division of the San Francisco Department of Public Health. She is also the STD Controller for the City and County of San Francisco. Dr. Philip has served as an investigator on numerous NIH and CDC funded STD and HIV clinical trials.  She served from 2016-2019 as a member of the CDC/HRSA Advisory Committee on HIV, Viral Hepatitis and STD Prevention and Treatment (CHAC).  Dr. Philip is an Assistant Clinical Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the University of California, San Francisco and is an HIV primary care provider at San Francisco City Clinic.

Members

Alice Gandelman, MPH, California Prevention Training Center (CAPTC) is the Director of the California Prevention Training Center (CAPTC) and has worked in the STD, HIV and sexual and reproductive health field for over 25 years.  She leads multiple state and national training and technical assistance programs to support public health and community workforce capacity.  CAPTC currently implements several CDC-funded programs including the STD Clinical Prevention Training Center, Disease Intervention Training Centers (DITCs) for curriculum development and training, and the Capacity Building Assistance (CBA) Program for integrated HIV activities and structural interventions.  CAPTC is part of the National Network of STD Prevention Training Centers (NNPTC).  During her tenure Alice has developed or led numerous initiatives that integrate practice-informed science to enhance our collective STD, HIV, and sexual and reproductive health work.  She believes that life-long learning to enrich current practice extends beyond traditional educational institutions and is essential for ensuring a competent and compassionate public health workforce.

Thomas L. Gift, PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention received a BA in economics from the University of Colorado at Denver, and a PhD in economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He is the Chief of the Health Services Research and Evaluation Branch in the Division of STD Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  His work at CDC has focused on assessing the STD prevention infrastructure in public health and on the cost-effectiveness of STD interventions.

Chaquetta Thomas Johnson, DNP, MPH, APRN, WHNP-BC, Louisiana Department of Health is Deputy Director of Operations with the Louisiana STD/HIV/Hepatitis Program. In this capacity, she is responsible for assisting with the oversight of statewide STD, HIV and Viral Hepatitis program activities and offers program-related clinical consultation to internal and external partners. She has more than 18 years of experience with the Louisiana Office of Public Health, including several years providing direct care services as a Women’s Health Nurse Practitioner and serving as a Regional Nurse Manager. She completed Bachelor of Science in Nursing and dual Master’s degrees in Nursing and Public Health at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.  Dr. Johnson completed her Doctor of Nursing Practice degree at Vanderbilt University where she was recognized for her work studying the relationship between contraceptive choice and the incidence of sexually transmitted infections. She has served on numerous civic and professional boards including her current service on the Louisiana Health Works Commission and the National Coalition of STD Directors (NCSD) Board of Directors.

Leonardo “Leo” Parker, Tennessee Department of Health is a highly motivated STD Program Director with over 19 years of experience in the education and prevention of sexually transmitted infections and HIV. Leo currently serves as the State STD Prevention Director at the Tennessee Department of Health.  Prior to this role Leo work at the Georgia Department of Public Health in their STD Office as the Prevention Services Manager.  His career path has been spent in HIV/STD Prevention where he started out as a program coordinator for one of the largest AIDS Services Organizations in the southeast and transitioning later as a Disease Investigator for the Georgia Department of Health.  Leo is a member of the National Coalition of STD Directors (NCSD) where he serves on the MSM Advisory Committee and the Policy Committee. He is also one of the newest members of their Board of Directors.

Hilary Reno, MD, PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is an Assistant Professor at Washington University, Division of Infectious Disease with a focus on sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and HIV. Her current projects focus on access to sexual health care and quality of that care in emergency departments and HIV care settings.  She also serves as the site principal investigator for STI clinical trials including studies that have evaluated new diagnostics as well as therapeutics.Dr. Reno is faculty for the CDC funded St. Louis STD/ HIV Prevention Training Center and a medical consultant with the CDC, Division of STD Prevention. She is the medical director of the St. Louis County Sexual Health clinic and director of the St. Louis STI Regional Response Coalition (STIRR), which she organized in 2015 to bring together health departments, clinical systems, community-based organizations, and others that care for patients with sexual health needs.

Karen Schlanger, PhD, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has served as the project lead for the Strengthening U.S. Response to Resistant Gonorrhea project in CDC’s Division of STD Prevention since 2016. Dr. Schlanger has an MPH from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a PhD in Public Health from the University of Georgia, and over 20 years of experience developing, managing, and evaluating local and national public health programs and conducting epidemiological investigations.

Program Definition/Prevention Services Committee

Matthew Hogben (Co-Chair), PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention received a doctorate in social psychology from the State University of New York, followed by post-doctoral training in the Department of Preventive Medicine and Community Health at Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, NY.  He is currently the Chief of the Social and Behavioral Research & Evaluation Branch of the Division of STD Prevention at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dr. Hogben’s primary focus is to apply social and behavioral science expertise to STD prevention and sexual health.  Past topics have included research and guidance on partner services recommendations for STD programs, expedited partner therapy, and sexual health care-seeking for adolescents and young adults.  Current priorities include analyses of sex and STD-related behaviors data in nationally representative data, management of STD and HIV in networks through enhanced partner services and disseminating prevention, and implementation of STD prevention in primary care and in non-traditional settings such as retail clinics.  Dr. Hogben serves on the editorial boards for Sexually Transmitted Diseases and Sexual Health. 

Julie Dombrowski (Co-Chair), MD, MPH, University of Washington is an Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington (UW) and Deputy Director of the Public Health – Seattle & King County HIV/STD Program.  Her research focuses on improving HIV & STI clinical and public health services for vulnerable populations in the US, with a particular focus on the HIV care continuum. She is a primary care physician in the Madison & Max HIV Clinics in Seattle. 





 

Members

Casey Copen, PhD, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention works as a Behavioral Scientist with the Social and Behavioral Research and Evaluation Branch (SABRE) in the Division of STD Prevention. Her work focuses on the social and behavioral aspects of STD and societal characteristics that influence STD rates.  In collaboration with Bob Kirkcaldy and others in the Epidemiology and Statistics Branch of DSTDP, Dr. Copen is co-leading a panel study to understand the network epidemiology of syphilis transmission among men who have sex with men at high risk of syphilis (NEST).  She is involved in several projects including modeling health care utilization data to evaluate the effect of a behavioral counseling intervention on adolescents and assessing how the CDC’s Social Vulnerability Index, a measure of community-level resilience to multiple stressors, informs STD case surveillance data.  Dr. Copen has a PhD in Sociology from the University of Southern California and an MPH in Health Behavior/Health Education from the University of Michigan.

Kendra Cuffe, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention l Britney Johnson, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Timothy Menza, MD, PhD, Oregon Health Authority is an infectious disease doctor specializing in HIV, STI, and hepatitis care.  He is the medical director of the Oregon Health Authority’s HIV/STD/TB Section and an assistant professor in the ID Division of the Oregon Health and Science University. 

Victoria Mobley, MD, MPH, North Carolina Department of Health & Human Services currently serves as the HIV/STD Medical Director and Field Services Unit Director for the North Carolina Division of Public Health’s, Communicable Disease Branch. Dr. Mobley received her medical degree from Duke University School of Medicine and completed an Internal Medicine residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. She completed a master’s degree in Epidemiology from the Gillings School of Global Public Health at UNC-Chapel Hill and an Infectious Diseases Fellowship from the UNC School of Medicine. 

Rob Stephenson, PhD, MSc, MA, University of Michigan School of Nursing is Professor and Chair of the Department of Systems, Population and Leadership in the School of Nursing at the University of Michigan, and Director of the Center for Sexuality and Health Disparities. Trained as a Demographer and Epidemiologist, Rob’s work focuses broadly on sexual and reproductive health, with specific foci on HIV prevention for sexual and gender minorities and women’s sexual and reproductive health needs in resource poor countries. In his HIV focused work, Rob’s mission is to develop and test culturally appropriate HIV prevention interventions for gay men and transgender populations, with a focus on youth and couples. 

Domain Committees

Clinical and Laboratory Committee

Ellen Kersh (Co-Chair), PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the Branch Chief of the Laboratory Reference and Research Branch (LRRB) in the Division of STD Prevention at CDC. She oversees CDC’s national and international laboratory activities on multiple STI. This encompasses development and evaluation of novel diagnostic assays, monitoring of antibiotic resistance, clinical reference testing, and technical assistance through specimen repositories and reference materials. Her branch leads the effort to build national laboratory capacity for gonorrhea drug resistance testing in CDC’s AR laboratory network. In prior roles, Dr. Kersh served in CDC’s HIV laboratory where she conducted studies on pre-exposure prophylaxis for HIV prevention, STI & HIV co-infection, and mucosal and reproductive risk factors for STI acquisition. She serves as a director of the WHO/ CDC Collaborating Centre for STI, on CDC committees for science management, on national HIV and STD Conference organizing committees, and is a chair of the CLSI gonorrhea working group.


Philip Chan (Co-Chair), MD, MS, Brown University is an Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine and School of Public Health at Brown University and physician in HIV and infectious diseases at The Miriam Hospital Immunology Center in Providence, Rhode Island. Dr. Chan also serves as Consultant Medical Director for the Rhode Island Department of Health Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STIs, and TB. Dr. Chan is Director of the Rhode Island STI Clinic located at The Miriam Hospital Immunology Center which offers community-based testing for HIV and other STIs. Dr. Chan also runs the pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) program at the clinic. He is working with the Rhode Island Department of Health and other community organizations on several statewide initiatives related to HIV and other STIs.

 

Members

William M. Geisler, MD, MPH, University of Alabama at Birmingham is a Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). He went to college and medical school at the University of Tennessee. He completed Internal Medicine Residency at the University of Michigan and an Infectious Diseases Fellowship at the University of Washington, where he also obtained an MPH in Epidemiology. He has established chlamydia and Mycoplasma genitalium research programs. He has over 20 years of clinical experience in the evaluation and management of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and provides STI education and training through the Alabama-North Carolina STD/HIV Prevention Training Center. He is on the editorial board of Sexually Transmitted Diseases and has served as an expert consultant for the CDC and WHO. He is also the Co-Director of the UAB Medical Scientist Training Program. 

Khalil Ghanem, MD, PhD, Johns Hopkins University Bayview Medical Center is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and in the Division of Population, Family, and Reproductive Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. His research focuses on genitourinary infections-in particular syphilis and the vaginal microbiome. He was a consultant to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on the development of the 2010, 2015, and 2020 Adult Syphilis Treatment Guidelines, is a consultant to the CDC for the development of the Syphilis Laboratory Guidelines, and president-elect of the American Sexually Transmitted Diseases Association.

Yonatan Grad, PhD, MD, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health is the Melvin J. and Geraldine L. Glimcher Assistant Professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health. His lab studies pathogen evolution and spread, with a focus on antibiotic resistance in N. gonorrhoeae.

Robert (Bob) Kirkcaldy, MD, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the team leader of the Epidemiology Research Team, Epidemiology Statistics Branch, in CDC’s Division of STD Prevention. He trained in Internal Medicine and Psychiatry at Tulane University and received a Masters degree from the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health. He came to CDC in 2008 as an Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) Officer assigned to the Division on STD Prevention. From 2010–2016, he led CDC’s surveillance of gonococcal resistance as the project officer for the Gonococcal Isolate Surveillance Project. Since 2016, he has led the Epidemiology Research Team, which conducts epidemiologic activities on a range of topics, including N. gonorrhoeae resistance and molecular epidemiology, extragenital gonorrhea and chlamydia, complications of chlamydia, STD outbreaks, STDs among transgender women and among men who have sex with men, and potential vaccines for gonorrhea.

Felicia Lewis, MD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention l Julie Schillinger, MD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Evaluation Committee

Patricia Dittus (Co-Chair), PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the Associate Director of Science in the Division of Adolescent and School Health (DASH) at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).  She obtained her doctoral degree in Social Psychology from the University at Albany, State University of New York and has been working at CDC for the past 20 years.  Much of her early research focused on parental influences on adolescent risk behavior and the evaluation of parent-based interventions to reduce adolescent STI, HIV, and pregnancy.  Her current interests include improving adolescent access to sexual and reproductive health care that is adolescent and LGBT friendly and finding ways for schools to address the mental health needs of students and families.  


Patricia Kissinger (Co-Chair), PhD, MPH, BSN , Tulane University School of Public Health & Tropical Medicine is Professor of Epidemiology at Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. For three decades, she has worked in the field of HIV, sexually transmitted diseases, and women’s reproductive health, focusing on the dynamics of STI/HIV transmission, particularly among vulnerable populations, examining issues of HIV/STI partner notification, expedited partner treatment, sexual networks, and the causes of repeat STIs. Serving as principal investigator on dozens of NIH and other federally funded research grants, she has published more than 160 manuscripts, 250 conference abstracts and numerous book chapters.  Dr. Kissinger is Associate Editor of the Sexually Transmitted Diseases, is a member of NIH college of reviewers, and has served as an expert consultant for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including work on the STD treatment guidelines.  She is presently a consultant for the National Academy of Science, Engineering and Math STD Work Group.
 

Members

Kathryn Brookmeyer, PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention earned her PhD in 2007 in developmental psychology and then went on to work for The Injury Center at CDC focused on global surveillance of sexual violence. In 2012, she joined DSTDP as a behavioral scientist and has since focused on the relationship between forced sex and STD acquisition, effective interventions among primary care providers, and linkage to care among STD clients who use high-risk substances, most recently.

Marion Carter, PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the team lead for program evaluation in the Division of STD Prevention, a role she has had since 2013.  She is trained as a social scientist (sociology & demography), and her public health career has involved both international and domestic work, largely focused on sexual and reproductive health.  She joined CDC in 2002 through the Epidemic Intelligence Service, where she worked with the Division of Reproductive Health.  Prior to joining DSTDP, she worked for CDC’s Global AIDS Program in Botswana (2004-2008) and the Division of Reproductive Health (2008-2013).

Stephanie Cohen, MD, MPH, San Francisco Department of Public Health is the medical director of San Francisco City Clinic and the section director for HIV and STD prevention in the SF Department of Public Health’s Disease Prevention and Control Branch.  She attended Harvard Medical School, and completed training in internal medicine and infectious diseases at the University of California, San Francisco and has a Masters in Public Health from the University of California, Berkeley. She attends on the HIV/ID consult service at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and provides STD drop-in care and HIV primary care at SF City Clinic.  Her research focuses on using implementation science to guide the translation of STD and HIV prevention research into clinical and public health practice. 

Wiley Jenkins, PhD, MPH, FACE Southern Illinois University Carbondale School of Medicine is Research Associate Professor and Chief, Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Department of Population Science and Policy, Southern Illinois University School of Medicine. His past 26 years’ experience have been split evenly between academia and the state health department. Research interests began in the area of sexually transmitted infection epidemiology and intervention; especially the consideration of rural populations. This transitioned into increased research into rural-urban disparities of cancer risk and care. Ultimately, these led to his current NIH-funded clinical trial developing, implementing and evaluating an intervention to address infectious disease transmission among rural people who use drugs. This work encompasses aspects of STI epidemiology and the engagement of a marginalized and stigmatized rural population with adequate services to reduce infection risk and increase infection identification and referral to treatment.

Jacky M. Jennings, PhD, MPH, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine with joint appointments in three departments at the Bloomberg School of Public Health. She is the Director of the Center of Child and Community Health Research (CCHR), a research center focused on eliminating disparities in STIs and HIV. She is also the Director of the Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Data Management (BEAD) Core, which provides epidemiologic and biostatistical research support services to faculty investigators across the institution. Dr. Jennings is a leading expert on transmission dynamics and the social determinants of extreme racial disparities in STIs and HIV among vulnerable populations such as youth and gay, bisexual and same gender loving men (MSM). Her specific area of interest is in determining the mechanisms through which place (physical or virtual) plays a role in local STI/HIV transmission dynamics.

James Matthias, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is an epidemiologist in the Division of STD Prevention for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention assigned to the Florida Department of Health. He graduated with his MPH from the University of Georgia. After graduation, James was a CDC/CSTE Applied Epidemiology Fellow (Class IX).

Policy Committee

Gale Burstein (Co-Chair), MD, MPH, Erie County Department of Public Health is the Erie County Commissioner of Health and a Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at the University at Buffalo Jacobs School Medicine in Buffalo, NY. Dr. Burstein is currently working on Erie County strategies to expand access to sexual health care, including PrEP and HPV vaccine; increase hepatitis C virus testing and treatment, including following exposed infants and linking to care; expand substance abuse prevention and treatment services; and prevent opioid related overdoses and deaths. Dr. Burstein co-chairs the Erie County Opioid Epidemic Task Force and participates in the NYS Hepatitis C Elimination Task Force. In 2017 Erie County experienced a decline in opioid related deaths; a trend continuing in 2020. Clinically, Dr. Burstein cares for cares youth with opioid use disorder and prescribes medication addiction treatment. Dr. Burstein participates in writing national adolescent health care guidelines and has been published in scientific peer review journals.

William Pearson, (Co-Chair), PhD, MHA, FACE, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention works as a health services researcher in the Division of STD Prevention. He holds a doctorate in health services policy and management from the University of South Carolina, and a Master of Health Administration degree from the Medical University of South Carolina. He has worked at the CDC since 2005 and his research interests have focused on the organization, financing and delivery of health care. He is a Fellow of the American College of Epidemiology and is an adjunct professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University. 

 

Members

Sean Bland, JD, O’Neil Institute, Georgetown University is a Senior Associate at the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law at Georgetown University Law Center and works on HIV/AIDS law and policy initiatives. Sean manages diverse projects to assist policymakers and HIV community stakeholders assess policy options for sustaining and adapting the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program, implementing the National HIV/AIDS Strategy, and leveraging HIV prevention and care systems to address STIs. He also leads projects related to the deployment of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) among communities of color and adolescents and the impact of laws and policies on the health and safety of people who engage in sex work. Sean holds a Juris Doctor from Georgetown University Law Center and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and German Studies from Yale University.

Harrell Chesson, PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is a health economist in the Division of STD Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  He earned his BA in economics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1990 and his PhD in economics from Duke University in 1996.  He joined CDC in 1996 as a Prevention Effectiveness Fellow.  His research focuses on the impact and cost-effectiveness of STD prevention programs and policies, including health economic analyses of human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination.

Ryan Cramer, JD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been with the CDC Division of STD Prevention since 2010 and currently serves as a Public Health Analyst where he performs policy analysis, conducts research at the intersection of policy and science, and provides policy-related technical assistance to stakeholders in the field of STD prevention.  He received his Juris Doctor from the University of Kansas in 2010 and his Master of Public Health from Emory University in 2011. 

Rebecca Gudeman, JD National Center for Youth Law is an expert on minor consent, confidentiality and information sharing law and focuses on access to sensitive health care for youth, including youth in the foster care and juvenile justice systems.  In addition to her advocacy work at NCYL, she trains and consults nationally on these issues.  She earned her B.A. from Harvard University, and her J.D. from the UCLA School of Law. She also holds a Master in Public Administration from Harvard.  In 1997, she was named the American Bar Association’s Young Lawyer Child Advocate of the Year. In 2015, she was awarded the National Chapter Recognition Award by the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine (SAHM).

Penny Loosier, PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is a Behavioral Scientist with the Division of STD Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and sits within the Community Assessment and Engagement team of the Social and Behavioral Research and Evaluation Branch. Current areas of research interest include congenital syphilis, social determinants of health, and adolescent sexual health. Dr. Loosier has been with CDC since 2006 and has worked in diverse domains within public health, including policy, program evaluation, quantitative analysis, ethnographic assessment, and partnerships/coalition-building. She graduated from the University of Alabama at Birmingham with a MPH (focus in Health Behavior) and a MA and PhD in Lifespan Developmental Psychology.

Naomi K. Seiler, JD, George Washington University is an Associate Professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the George Washington University School of Public Health.  Professor Seiler’s research centers on the intersection of the evolving healthcare system with public health priorities  While at GW, she has served as a consultant for the CDC's National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention; her portfolio currently includes leading a team providing policy support for D.C.'s HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis, STD and TB Administration.  She worked in Congress as Counsel to Rep. Henry Waxman, helping develop public health legislation including the prevention and wellness provisions of the House health reform bill.  She also served as lead House staffer on the reauthorization of the Ryan White Care Act and staffed hearings and legislative markups on HIV prevention, federal mental health and substance abuse programs, health disparities, and other public health topics. 

Clinical Case Series

Laura Quilter (Co-Chair), MD, MPH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is a medical epidemiologist on the Clinical Team within the Division of STD Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). She joined CDC as an Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer within the Division of STD Prevention in 2017. Prior to her arrival at CDC, Dr. Quilter completed her infectious diseases fellowship and received her Master of Public Health in Global Health at the University of Washington. She completed her internal medicine residency at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, earned her medical degree from the Indiana University School of Medicine, and received her bachelor’s degree from Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana. Dr. Quilter’s interests have focused on public health and STD prevention with prior research experience involving extragenital gonococcal and chlamydial infections, neurosyphilis, and the surveillance of antimicrobial resistance in N. gonorrhoeae.


Bradley Stoner (Co-Chair), MD, PhD, Washington University, St. Louis is an Associate Professor of Anthropology and Medicine at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, where he specializes in the clinical care and epidemiological analysis of sexually transmitted infections.  He received MD and PhD degrees at Indiana University, and completed internal medicine residency training at Duke University Medical Center, followed by infectious disease fellowship training at the University of Washington in Seattle.  His research addresses social and behavioral determinants of STI/HIV risk, sexual networks, and clinical epidemiology of STIs.  He currently serves as Medical Director of the St. Louis STD/HIV Prevention Training Center.  He is past-president of the American Sexually Transmitted Diseases Association (ASTDA), and is board-certified in infectious diseases and internal medicine.

 

Members

Christine Johnston, MD, MPH, University of Washington is an Associate Professor in the Division of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine at University of Washington.  She received her undergraduate degree in biochemistry from Brown University and her medical degree from University of Minnesota. She completed internal medicine residency and infectious diseases fellowship at University of Washington. She is an NIH-funded physician-scientist who performs clinical studies of genital herpes simplex virus infection. In addition, she is the Medical Director of the University of Washington STD Prevention Training Center, which is part of the CDC-funded National Network of STD Clinical Prevention Training Centers (NNPTC). Dr. Johnston cares for patients with HIV infection and other infectious diseases in the inpatient and outpatient setting at Harborview Medical Center. 

Ina Park, MD, MS, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is an Associate Professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine.  She also serves as Medical Director of the California Prevention Training Center and a Medical Consultant for the Division of STD Prevention at CDC. She is the author of Strange Bedfellows: Adventures in the Science, History, and Surprising Secrets of STDs.

Susan Tuddenham, MD, MPH, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine