Sarah Bacon, PhD

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Sarah Bacon

Associate Director, Office of Strategy and Innovation

 

Areas of Expertise

  • Adverse childhood experiences
  • Youth violence
  • Firearm violence prevention
  • Developmental criminology
  • Opioid overdose prevention
  • Prevention effectiveness research

Sarah Bacon, PhD, is the associate director for the Office of Strategy and Innovation (OSI) within CDC’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC).  In this role, Dr. Bacon provides center-wide leadership and coordination of NCIPC’s strategic priorities, including ACEs, overdose, and suicide. She also oversees, supports, and coordinates other center-wide initiatives, such as data science and health equity.

Dr. Bacon is a practice-oriented prevention scientist with experience spanning the fields of law enforcement, academia, and public health. Across these disciplines and different domains, the common thread is her commitment to using data and science to make communities safer.

Dr. Bacon began her time at CDC in 2010 in the Division of Violence Prevention, where she was the lead scientist for the National Centers of Excellence in Youth Violence Prevention, a strategic initiative for implementing and evaluating violence prevention strategies in high-burden communities.

In 2015, she joined the Division of Overdose Prevention, where she led the state-based overdose prevention programmatic efforts. She joined OSI in November of 2019 as the senior advisor on adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). In this role, she provided strategic leadership and coordination across a range of injury and violence topics as they relate to ACEs. She also ensured strategic collaboration throughout CDC and with external agencies focusing on ACEs.

Dr. Bacon is focused on advancing the evidence of effectiveness for prevention of ACEs and mitigation of their impact, and on ensuring that the science is translated into action in communities across the country.