I turn 34 today.
I’m more than one-third of the way through my life, and I’ve spent a lot of time lately asking myself what I have to show for it.
I was 30 years old when I began my work as manager of data and surveillance for COVID-19 at the Florida Department of Health (DOH).
At the time, I was a rising star in my field.
My efforts in leading Florida’s pandemic tracking systems earned me magazine features in my alumni magazine at Syracuse University and in technical blogs like this one. I led inter-agency state calls on best practices for data with FEMA, and the data schema I developed became the national standard for reporting during the pandemic.
Then everything changed.
Since then, my story – told in part, retold in another part, lied about, buried, attacked, silenced – has become mired in controversy.
An army of DeSantis trolls and stalkers scour social media daily, attacking any mention of my name with defamatory accusations and links to dedicated stalker websites created by members o…
