COVID-19 and Frontline Workers: Nurses, Doctors, and Essential Personnel

Lori Tremmel Freeman has been the Chief Executive Officer for the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) since May 2018, having returned to the organization after previously served as its Associate Executive Director from 2010-2014.

In the CEO role, Ms. Freeman works to ensure our country’s nearly 3,000 local health departments have the capacity to deliver essential health services to their communities, advocates for local public health within the U.S. governmental public health system, and assures strategic alliances and partnerships with a wide variety of federal, state, local, public and private agencies and organizations to advance the health of our nation. Prior to joining NACCHO, she served as Chief Executive Officer for the Association of Maternal & Child Health Programs (AMCHP) where she provided direction and leadership to protect and promote the optimal health of women, children, and families and actively advocated for sustainable and long-term funding for maternal, child, and adolescent health through the federal Title V grant program. While at AMCHP, she received the distinguished HHS Maternal & Child Health Bureau Director’s Award for noteworthy contributions to the health of infants, mothers, children, adolescents and children with special health care needs.

Lori Tremmel Freeman is a career non-profit executive, having enjoyed three decades of working in senior association leadership and management roles. Lori Tremmel Freeman’s career includes holding additional CEO and senior leadership positions with the International Test and Evaluation Association (ITEA); Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI); the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging (SNMMI); the American Public Health Association (APHA); and Grant Thornton LLP. She also serves on numerous national advisory groups and Boards related to public health. She received a Bachelor of Science degree in Management Science from Lock Haven University and a Masters degree in Business Administration and Marketing minor from Indiana University of Pennsylvania and currently resides in Haymarket, Virginia with her husband and twin children.

Elizabeth Peralta works in the Food and Beverage industry where her mission is to create a sustainable and equitable food system. Peralta has served as the Executive Director of the National Supermarket Association (NSA), where she served to protect the interest of over 500 supermarket owners on the East Coast. It was there where she established White House contact, worked with legislators to pass bills, and created strong partnerships with partners like Lyft, Coca-Cola, Pepsico, and many others to help the most vulnerable New Yorkers.  Because of her work before and during the COVID-19 pandemic to protect grocers and the food insecure Peralta was even nominated and selected to be on “City and State’s New York Power 100 list”. Before her time in the Food and Beverage Industry, Peralta was heavily involved in the nonprofit world, where she worked at several museums in New York City and Washington D.C., including the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture before it’s inaugural opening. In 2013, Peralta was awarded a fellowship at the Brooklyn Historical Society, where she researched, curated and developed programming on the common misconceptions of American slavery in New York. In her spare time Peralta proudly serves as the Chair of the Food Education Fund Junior Board, where she alongside the board, works hard to empower those students to be our Food industry leaders of tomorrow.

Prior to becoming the Director of School Health Services for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, Karen spent thirteen years as the Director of Health, Safety and Equity Programs for the Northampton Public Schools, and had additionally functioned as the Program Director for the Northampton Prevention Coalition, which was federally funded to reduce youth substance use in the City of Northampton. Karen also currently serves her hometown as Chair of the East Longmeadow Board of Health. She received her Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Fitchburg State University, her Master’s in Nursing Management from Elms College, and her MBA, with a concentration in Healthcare Leadership, also from Elms College. Karen is a Nationally Certified School Nurse, a member of National Association of School Nurses/Massachusetts School Nurse Organization, and an inactive member of Sigma Theta Tau, Epsilon Beta chapter.

Craig Andrade is Associate Dean of Practice and Director of the Activist Lab at Boston University’s School of Public Health (SPH) where he is serves to catalyze and encourage SPH’s public health practice portfolio locally and globally among all members of the school community, including faculty, staff, students, alumni, and community partners. He is also a member of the Dean’s Cabinet and the Governing Council and chairs the school’s permanent practice committee.

Previously Dr. Andrade was the Director of the Bureau of Family Health & Nutrition (BFHN) at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH). BFHN’s programs include Early Intervention (EI), Pregnancy, Infancy and Early Childhood, Children and Youth with Special Health Needs, Women, Infants and Children (WIC) Nutrition Program, Home Visiting, Title V Maternal and Child Health Block Grant, Breastfeeding Initiative, Birth Defects Surveillance, Universal Newborn Hearing Screening Program, the Office of Data Translation and Birth Defects Research and Prevention. He also served as Director of the Division of Health Access at DPH, helped found the Racial Equity Leadership Team and Cross-Department Racial Equity Collaborative at DPH and was Associate Dean of Health and Wellness and Director of Student Health Services at Wheaton College in Norton, MA.

He served as critical care, public health and ward nurse at Boston Medical Center; nurse manager and head athletic trainer at Buckingham Browne & Nichols School in Cambridge, MA; and was owner/operator of Active Health, a private health and fitness company. Craig is a registered nurse, athletic trainer, licensed massage therapist and strength and condition specialist with masters and doctoral degrees in public health from Boston University. His research interests include behavioral risk management and resilience-building among children, adolescents and young adults.