Richard Franka
Dr. Richard Franka is a Deputy Team Lead for Nigeria Team within Polio Eradication Branch, Global Immunization Division. He received his Master of Public Health degree in epidemiology at the University of South Florida in 2015. He earned his Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree (1999) and his PhD in the infectious diseases (2003) from the University of Veterinary Medicine, Košice, Slovak Republic. As a part of his PhD studies, Dr. Franka worked and studied in the Rabies Unite at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, France. Upon graduation, Dr. Franka worked as a veterinary medical officer at the Slovak National Reference Laboratory for Rabies in Zvolen, Slovak Republic. After receiving a prestigious post-doctoral fellowship from the American Society for Microbiology in 2003, Dr. Franka joined the CDC Rabies program. Over his 13 year career at CDC, Dr. Franka has served in multiple leadership positions such as a Director of the OIE Reference Laboratory for Rabies, Lead for Immunology, Pathogenesis and Animal Studies Unit as well as acting Rabies Team Lead. He has co-authored more than 46 publications and 3 book chapters on such topics as: phylogeny of lyssaviruses, pathogenesis of lyssaviruses, laboratory diagnostics of rabies, host immune responses, experimental evaluation of various biologics for rabies prophylaxis and treatment, detection of pathogens in bats in Africa as well as multiple epidemiologic investigations nationally and internationally. Dr. Franka was integral part of the research that led to the changes in ACIP recommendations to a 4-dose vaccine schedule for human rabies PEP and the development of mouse monoclonal antibody cocktail for post-exposure prophylaxis in humans. Dr. Franka is a member of multiple advisory committees, including the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, Human Rabies Vaccine Working Group, member of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee as well as a member of the International Encephalitis Consortium.
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