Using Integrated Surveillance to Study Emerging Infectious Diseases in Agricultural Workers and Other Vulnerable Populations in Rural Guatemala

Dan Olson, MD, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the Section of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at the University of Colorado School of Medicine with secondary appointments in the Colorado School of Public Health and CU School of Engineering. His research focuses on measuring the clinical and socioeconomic impact of emerging infectious diseases in resource-limited settings and evaluating the effects of interventions such as vaccines. This work, which takes place primarily in rural, southwest Guatemala, includes an integrated respiratory and arbovirus surveillance program for agricultural workers, their households, and two regional hospitals, connecting community-based surveillance to real-time molecular diagnostics and sequencing. These projects often include a One Health component, linking human disease to environmental conditions (i.e. chronic kidney disease of unknown etiology) or zoonotic exposures (i.e. xenosurveillance). He was a Fogarty Fellow at UNC Project in 2010 and has ongoing collaborations at the Guatemala site with UNC Faculty focusing on enteric infections, arbovirus serosurveillance, and nutrition/neurodevelopment.