Dr. Claire Jarashow ’96

In January 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic began, Dr. Jarashow was Chief of the Epidemiology and Data Unit leading the outbreak response. In September 2020, she moved over to lead the planning and roll-out of the COVID-19 vaccine to the 10 million L.A. County residents. Prior to these roles, she was an Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) Officer with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); consulted for the World Health Organization; received a Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Grand Challenge Exploration Award; worked for CDC and other non-governmental organizations in various countries in Africa, Central America, and the Caribbean building public health surveillance systems, analyzing communicable disease data, and building local epidemiology and data use capacity for data-driven decision making in ministries of health. Dr. Jarashow holds a PhD in Epidemiology from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a Master of Public Health from Columbia University.