Dr. Jeanette Dawa

Jeanette Dawa (MBChB, MSc, PhD) is an epidemiologist and public health specialist with a background in medicine, public health and infectious disease modeling. She is the scientific manager at the Center for Epidemiological Modeling and Analysis (CEMA), at the University of Nairobi, Kenya. CEMA analyses public health data to provide insights that support decision-making in health.

She has managed several health projects within Kenya, working closely with the community, health care workers, county governments, and the national government to support childhood vaccination against respiratory diseases, conduct surveillance for severe acute respiratory illness, and strengthen infection prevention and control capacity within hospitals. Jeanette has previously served as Center Director for the Centers for Research in Emerging Infectious Diseases – East and Central Africa (CREID-ECA), which is part of a NIH-funded global network of research centers.

Jeanette has supported the Ministry of Health, Kenya in identifying top-priority infectious diseases. She has also served as an external resource person for the Kenya National Immunization Technical Advisory Group (KENITAG), where she supported the systematic collection, assessment, and review of available data to support evidence-based decision-making in the field of vaccination.

She served as a member of the modeling committee advising the Kenyan government on appropriate public health measures during the emergence of COVID-19 in 2020. Jeanette’s interests lie in the use of analytic methods to enhance the utility of surveillance data in decision-making, and conducting research that leads to direct changes in practice and health policy.