Annual Report Feb 16 2021

Go Forth To Serve
Brittany Brown, MPH ‘13
“The pandemic is the crux of our
public health career”
“ Brittany Brown found her love for public health when she decided to apply to
the BYU MPH program. She said, “It was exactly what I’m passionate about,
the perfect combination between health, nutrition, medicine, and helping people.”
Brown works as an Epidemiology and Evaluation Manager at the Utah Department
of Health, Healthy Living Through Environment, Policy, and Improved Clinical Care
(EPICC) Program. She manages a team of epidemiologists and works on evaluation and data surveillance for
conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, and obesity prevention work. The best part of the job, for Brown, is
“getting to see the impact that we’re having in the communities and to hear the success stories of the people we’re
working with.”
COVID-19 has been a turning point in Brown’s career. She noted, “It’s the crux of our public health career.” She
has helped with contact tracing, developing surveys, and vaccination, and has seen how COVID has escalated health
disparities. She said,“People are finally starting to see that there’s a big problem and we need to address it. It’s been
exciting to see people start to prioritize reducing disparities within our communities.”
Throughout her career, Brown has continued to use the skills she developed in the BYU MPH program. She said, “I
appreciated how the classes and projects were focused on real-life applicability. I felt very prepared to step into my
public health career.”
Brown has served as Chair of the National Association of Chronic Disease Directors (NACDD) Epidemiology and
Evaluation Collaborative, and currently serves on the Executive Committee for the NACDD Cardiovascular Health
Council. She has volunteered with the Utah Medical Reserve Corps, an emergency response team during a Hepatitis
A outbreak among the homeless population.
Victor Arredondo, MPH ‘13
Victor Arredondo realized that public health was the career for him while
completing his pre-med courses. He said, “I realized that I wasn’t going to be
part of the change that I wanted to be part of if I went one patient at a time. I
wanted something bigger and quicker.”
Since then, Arredondo has been actively involved in creating change for entire
communities. He works for the American Heart Association as the Senior
Community Impact Director, assessing community needs and evaluating solutions.
For him, the best part of the job is being able to see the health of a population
improve, step by step.
When COVID hit, Arredondo and his team had to move quickly to change focus. The needs of the community
had dramatically changed. Arredondo said, “Before we were talking about building safe and walkable streets and
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