Linda Venczel, PhD, MSPH. Dr. Venczel is the Director of the Epidemic Preparedness and Response Program at PATH and a senior epidemiologist with over 25 years of experience addressing infectious diseases in resource-poor settings in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. She has worked in over 50 countries during her career and speaks fluent French, Spanish, Wolof and Hungarian. Her experience includes establishing new, community-based surveillance systems; innovative research on the use of new diagnostic methods; linking of existing surveillance systems and field surveys to better understand the burden of infectious diseases; improving access to data for use in modeling disease burden and the potential impact of proposed interventions; and improving the quality of data used in health information systems. Dr. Venczel’s areas of expertise include disease surveillance, antimicrobial resistance, polio, WASH, outbreak investigation, research and development on new interventions for vaccine-preventable diseases, and extensive experience establishing and coordinating initiatives with global partners such as the World Health Organization, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, US Agency for International Development, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Rotary International, and the private sector. She was a Peace Corps volunteer in Senegal, West Africa, and trained in the Epidemic Intelligence Service at CDC.  Dr. Venczel holds both a PhD and an MSPH in epidemiology and environmental health from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.​​