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Epidemiologist

Senior Technical Officer for National Public Health Institutes (NPHIs), Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC)

Chioma Dan-Nwafor is an Epidemiologist with over 15 years progressive leadership experience in epidemiology, health security, emergency preparedness and response, and public health systems strengthening. She currently serves as Senior Technical Officer for National Public Health Institutes (NPHIs) and Capacity Building at the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), where she provides strategic leadership to strengthen NPHIs and advance regional health security across Southern Africa. Her career spans national, regional, and continental public health leadership. At the Africa CDC Southern and Western Regional Coordinating Centres, she has led technical support to over 25 Member States on NPHI establishment and strengthening, cross-border surveillance, outbreak preparedness and response, workforce development, ISO 9001 quality management systems, and regional coordination platforms. At Africa CDC Headquarters in Addis Ababa, she contributed to the development of continental pandemic preparedness frameworks, Public Health Emergency Operations Centre (PHEOC) guidance, simulation exercises, and rapid response coordination.

Before joining Africa CDC, Chioma served as a Senior Epidemiologist at the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), where she was the National Incident Manager for the Lassa Fever Emergency Operations Centre and coordinated responses to Lassa fever, COVID-19, cholera, meningitis, measles, Mpox, and other public health threats. She also supported Nigeria’s implementation of the International Health Regulations (2005), Joint External Evaluations, and preparedness assessments. Her early public health career began during the 2014 Ebola outbreak, serving as a Contact Tracing Supervisor in Nigeria before deploying to Liberia as an Epidemiologist with the African Union Support to the Ebola Outbreak in West Africa (ASEOWA), experiences that laid the foundation for her commitment to strengthening resilient public health systems across Africa.

Chioma has authored over 50 peer-reviewed publications and is the lead author of Nigeria’s national Lassa Fever Response Guidelines. She has received several awards, including the Excellence Award for Lassa Fever Response (2019), Best Oral Poster Award at the 9th TEPHINET Global Conference (2018), and the Healthcare Leadership Award (2024).

She holds a Master of Public Health in Field Epidemiology and Laboratory Practice from the University of Ibadan, a Bachelor of Medical Laboratory Science from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, is a Distinguished Fellow of the Improving Public Health Management for Action Programme, and is currently pursuing a Doctor of Public Health (DrPH). Her professional interests include health security, emergency preparedness, One Health, surveillance, workforce development, and strengthening resilient public health institutions across Africa.