Chika C. Okafor, associate professor and director of veterinary public health at the University of Tennessee College of Veterinary Medicine, is the new president-elect of the epidemiology speciality of the American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine (ACVPM). He will become president in 2027.
A Tennessee faculty member since 2015, Dr. Okafor is a pre-harvest food safety epidemiologist who focuses on identifying patterns of antimicrobial use and resistance in veterinary medicine. He has published extensively on antimicrobial use practices in livestock and on diseases that drive the increased use of antimicrobials in cattle.
“As a veterinarian, I became increasingly interested in understanding disease not only at the individual animal level but also at the population level,” said Dr. Okafor. “Epidemiology provides the tools needed to generate evidence that informs decision-making and improves animal health, public health, and disease prevention.”
Dr. Okafor earned his doctor of veterinary medicine degree from the University of Nigeria. He later received his master’s degree in food safety and his Ph.D. in epidemiology from Michigan State University. Before joining the Tennessee faculty, he spent three years conducting postdoctoral research in nutritional epidemiology at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada.
