John Auerbach is ICF’s primary federal health expert and thought leader within the company’s public sector business. John’s thought leadership advances ICF’s combination of proven domain and scientific expertise with leading-edge analytics and technology solutions to drive improved health outcomes for clients.
Eddie Kirkland is a Director of Data Science at ICF and a leading statistics and AI expert with more than 20 years of experience in data and organizational leadership. He specializes in guiding data-rich projects from concept to delivery, working directly with clients to identify areas of need, developing custom solutions in an agile framework, and delivering clear and meaningful results. As a data scientist, Eddie supports federal clients including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in various research areas by delivering full-stack DataOps solutions. He created an automated surveillance system for tracking nationwide school closures and leveraged generative artificial intelligence from a self-hosted large language model. Eddie also architected and engineered a natural language processing engine—which helps distill public health trends from raw social media data—and a Robotic Process Automation (RPA) platform, which reduced months of painstaking research to a fully automated natural language processing-based system.
By prioritizing staff education, starting small with practical applications, and establishing clear guidelines, local health departments can lay the foundation for sustainable AI adoption. This approach ultimately enhances efficiency, improves health outcomes, and ensures cost-effective care for the communities they serve.