Meaghan Batchelor

Meaghan Batchelor is a Principal Population Health Data Scientist at Arizona State University's Health Observatory, where she transforms complex public health data into compelling visual stories and actionable information. She develops automated surveillance systems, disease models, public health tools and interactive visuals that make epidemiological insights accessible to diverse audiences, from policymakers to frontline responders.

This work builds on her experience as an epidemiologist at Maricopa County Department of Public Health, where she modernized heat morbidity and mortality surveillance systems that inform preparedness and emergency response. She reduced report generation time by 90%, developed the county's first interactive dashboards for real-time heat-related death and illness reporting, and created novel quality assurance systems for accurate classification of heat-related cases. 

Her public health career began during the COVID-19 pandemic as a disease investigator, where she conducted case interviews, managed data entry teams during surges, and entered communicable disease reports into Arizona's disease surveillance system. During her graduate studies, she served as a Graduate Research Assistant for the University of Arizona's Student Aid for Field Epidemiology Response (SAFER) Team, conducting COVID-19 case investigations and contact tracing, and completed an MPH internship with USAID's Indonesia Urban Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Project, where she documented citizen engagement mechanisms, conducted qualitative analysis of WASH interventions, and produced English-language articles on successful public health initiatives in rural Indonesia. 

Her expertise spans climate-health analytics, spatial epidemiology, and cloud-based data infrastructure, with particular passion for science communication, public health history, and the interconnections between human, animal, and environmental health.