KAREN M. BECKER DVM, MPH
Senior Health Adviser

After the September 11th attacks, Karen Becker was called from her position at HHS's Office of International and Refugee Health to work in Secretary Tommy Thompson's Emergency Command Center. When the Office of Public Health Preparedness was created in October 2001, Dr. Becker came on board as a Senior Health Advisor to the Director, to develop programs that will strengthen state and local public health emergency preparedness.

From 1998-2000, Dr. Becker served as an Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer for the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention with the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services in Raleigh, North Carolina. She worked extensively with local health departments and hospitals on the investigation of infectious disease outbreaks and the development and implementation of surveillance systems to monitor illnesses, injuries and death during the time when North Carolina was devastated by a series of hurricanes.

Dr. Becker earned a B.A. in Human Biology from Brown University, a Doctorate in Veterinary Medicine from the University of Illinois and a Masters of Public Health from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland.