John M. Colford Jr.

John M. Colford Jr. is a Professor of Epidemiology at the University of California, Berkeley's School of Public Health. He holds an MD from Johns Hopkins University, an MPH and PhD from UC Berkeley, and completed medical training at Stanford and UCSF. His research focuses on waterborne infectious diseases and clinical trial design, with a global emphasis on improving water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) interventions in low-resource settings. He has led randomized trials in countries like Bangladesh, Kenya, and India, evaluating the impact of WASH on child health outcomes.

Dr. Colford teaches courses on epidemiologic methods and randomized controlled trials at UC Berkeley and serves as an attending physician in Infectious Diseases at the UCSF/VA Medical Center. His work spans environmental health, global health equity, and the integration of machine learning into public health research. Major themes in his publications include climate change impacts on disease transmission, the role of WASH in reducing antibiotic use, and addressing social determinants of child growth and development.

His scientific contributions include pioneering studies on household sanitation effectiveness and the long-term health implications of early childhood growth faltering. Dr. Colford's trials often involve interdisciplinary collaborations, combining epidemiology, environmental engineering, and behavioral science to address systemic health challenges in marginalized populations.