USA
Dr Ermias Belay, MD
Associate Director for Epidemiologic Science for the Division of High-Consequence Pathogens and Pathology, National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
Ermias D. Belay has helped establish various aspects of CDC’s nationwide prion disease surveillance programs, and directs CJD case and cluster investigations related to its iatrogenic transmission and the zoonotic transmission of prion diseases. Dr. Belay’s career at CDC has also included working on influenza epidemiology, coordination of surveillance programs for Kawasaki syndrome and Reye syndrome, outbreak investigations of these diseases, and studies involving the identification of possible etiologic agents of Kawasaki syndrome. His area of interest extends to poxviruses, hemorrhagic fever viruses, and zoonotic transmission of infectious diseases. Dr. Belay was trained as a medical doctor and epidemiologist and first joined CDC in 1994 as an Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer.