<p>If anybody who works in public health or epidemiology could answer any of these questions, it would be really cool. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>What is the climate like for private sector/NGO public health jobs? I'm under the impression that the majority of public health jobs are with local or state health departments and the CDC. </p></li>
<li><p>How difficult is it to break into global health (i.e. the UN, UNICEF, WHO)? Would having an MPH specializing in epidemiology (and language skills of course) be sufficient for these jobs or would a MD/PhD be necessary?</p></li>
<li><p>What is the daily grind like for an epidemiologist? How are epidemiological computing and modelling used in the day-to-day work environment? Is there a big market for the epidemiology of infectious and chronic diseases in the US?</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I’m a MPH/JD who worked in health care, including public health, for 10 years before becoming an attorney. My father was an epidemiologist and had an MPH and PHD. He was a career state employee. My perception is most public health jobs (as opposed to health care administrator jobs) are with government and private agencies. I expect that will be a really tight market in the future with government budget cuts. That would certainly be the case for epidemiology. Yes, being an MD would help - especially if you specialized in infectious disease. They will typically be at the top of the pyramid in any bureaucracy, although there will be PHDs as well. There are quite a few MD/MPH folks out there. If you are good in the lab, there may be private lab jobs as well - but those are going to be more on the order of microbiology and chemistry. The military is an alternate route. My cousin went through medical school with the army, specialized in ID and then, as I understand it, was loaned out to WHO. 10 years in Thailand, 5 years in Brazil, 5 years in Switzerland. Now retired from the military and is the medical director on one for the Hawaiian islands (state job). He still gets called to go to Africa and Asia from time to time. From a career advancement perspective, an MPH is not enough, IMHO.</p>
<p>I work in the policy end of public health, with the epidemiologists, and have for 20 years. State government. The job market is very, very tight just now, and seems to be getting worse. There is a lot of contract work, but few real jobs. We just hired a prevention epidemiologist, and had hundreds and hundreds of applicants for one, relatively poorly paid, position.</p>
<p>In much of the Third World, UNESCO/UNICEF are hiring mostly folks trained in the Third World. Many U.S.-trained doctors and public health people, frankly, have a difficult time hacking it without the raft equipment they are used to. (There are some amazing folks, though - think Paul Farmer.)</p>
<p>Oddly, there seem to be tons of job opportunities for accountants who wish to work in Third World NGOs.</p>
<p>In our state, one of my friends who works for the state just hired an emergency hire to help her with statistics because there were severe funding cuts to her department & she lost one full time staff member. The guy had like 3 masters degrees including one in public health and one in EE & one in something else. She’s embarrassed at how little she is able to pay him & had to fight to allow him to get the funds she wanted to pay him. He gets no benefits & his position is only funded for 89 days at a time, with no guarantee of renewal!</p>
<p>The PhDs in our state at DOH make around $50K or so, I believe, plus some benefits. The salary remains pretty flat, even tho they remain at the same place for many years. If you don’t work for the state or federal government, jobs are very few & far between. You can free lance and help write grants & do data analysis, but it’s a limited market and quite competitve and not sure how well it pays since most of us non-profits are barely staying afloat.</p>
<p>I just wanted to chime in that there is a solid demand for biostatisticians. There are jobs in industry (particularly drug and device companies), academia, and government. Earning a degree in epidemiology requires biostat courses. If you like the biostat courses, you might consider studying biostatistics.</p>
<p>“The PhDs in our state at DOH make around $50K or so, I believe, plus some benefits.”</p>
<p>Yup, it’s those overpaid government workers again. (I could make around 40% more in the private sector.) The one we just hired, has a Ph.D. in epi, M.P.H., and an M.P.A., and gets around $54k, I think. There is virtually no upward career path, and instead of being frozen, salaries were reduced 3% this year.</p>
<p>Thanks for the help. Epidemiology does not seem like a prudent financial decision. I’m good at math so I’m definitely receptive to the idea of getting my Phd in biostats. I just find it a little odd that biostatistics is considered a sub-field of public health since most jobs are with pharmaceutical or biotech companies.</p>
<p>DS’s gf has an MPH and works for the CDC. She seems quite happy, but I haven’t asked how hard it was to get the position with CDC. Its a traineeship and she’s about to be transferred aross country for 2 years :(</p>
<p>Big Pharma is not doing remotely as well as one may be thinking. In Mrs. Turbo’s company (large US Pharma) everything that is not nailed to the walls is being outsourced… The PhD levels have fared slightly better attrition wise but I would strongly investigate future employment prospects as patents run out and nothing comes in. A PhD in general statistics with coursework in biostatistics may be a bit more useful.</p>
<p>In addition to the CDC many of the fed govt epid positions are either at the huge HHS complex in Rockville or at HHS headquarters near the US Capitol.
With the current political climate I would be concerned about some of the state and local as well as federal govt opportunities drying up.</p>
<p>Statistics has never been a field for the faint-at-heart employment wise. Back when Mrs. Turbo was playing statistician I recall two distinct employment opportunities. One was for a PhD to study infectious diseases in Uganda/Kenya (hmm. I’d rather not :-)). The other was worse - The obituaries page of the American Statistical Association journal had a notice about a famous statistician who bought the farm in a car accident; sure enough, a few pages later on, his employer had a huge wanted ad for his position (or one eeriely similar to his).</p>
<p>In the large Pharma/Med centers (NJ, Boston, LA, Chicago, Atlanta, Houston) employment opportunities are scarce but are there. In fly-over country… Maybe in state government where one can ponder spending a decade to earn Dept. of Motor Vehicle wages…</p>
<p>There are many jobs for Ph.D. biostatisticians that are not with drug companies. Research hospitals and universities are major employers. M.S. biostatistician positions are fairly widespread, too. The demand for biostatisticians still exceeds the supply.</p>
<p>There is a good job market for biostatisticians, and other kinds of statisticians, in government and industry.</p>
<p>You might want also to consider the apparently growing field of health informatics/health information systems. Several universities are expanding their graduate programs in those areas.</p>
<p>There are many jobs in public health. I used my degree to get a job as a Medicaid consultant at a corporation that works with medical software. I love my public health degree. The “catch” is to simultaneously have a software background - the more the better. Do you also have three years of experience as a web master, C# programmer, know web services for .Net, javascript/HTML, etc? If not, then you can earn a certificate in some type of web-based programming while also earning the public health degree. The dual set is fantastic right now. The problem is that a lot of public health students don’t go the extra mile to earn that background in information technology. That’s sad because that’s where the jobs are at - the intersection between advanced internet software and public health.</p>