Armed Forces Research Institute of Medical Sciences (AFRIMS)
MHRP Collaborator
COL Jessica Cowden is the Chief of the Department of Retrovirology at USAMD-AFRIMS in Bangok, Thailand. Prior to this position, she served as the Acting Chief Medical Officer for Enabling Biotechnologies at the Joint Program Executive Office for Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Defense (JPEO-CBRND) from
May 2020 to June 2021. In her role at JPEO-CBRND, she served as the coordinator/lead for DoD Military Treatment Facility site participation in USG-funded Phase 3 trials of COVID vaccine candidates in development and served as a DoD representative on the Interagency Federal Response (previously named Operation Warp Speed) Vaccine Clinical Team, the Coronavirus Prevention Network (CoVPN), and the SARS-CoV-2 Interagency Risk Assessment Group (SCIRAM).
Prior to her assignment at JPEO-CNRND, Dr. Cowden served as Chief of Infectious Disease Programs at the Defense Institute for Medical Operations (2016-2021). Prior to that, she served as Director of the Kenya Medical Research Institute/Walter Reed Project (KEMRI/WRP) Kombewa Clinical Research Center and the Kisumu Field Station at the U.S. Army Medical Research Directorate-Kenya
(MRD-K) from 2012 to 2016.
Col Cowden is board certified in Pediatrics and Pediatric Infectious Diseases. She earned her Bachelor of
Science in Biology and her Bachelor of Arts in English Literature from Binghamton University and her Medical Degree from the State University of New York at Buffalo. She completed her residency in Pediatrics at Wright Patterson Air Force Base/Wright State University in Ohio and her fellowship in Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Denver Children’s Hospital/University of Colorado School of the Health Sciences. She earned her Masters of Science in Public Health from the University of Colorado. She has worked as an attending at the Children’s Hospital New Orleans, the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, the Kombewa District Hospital (Kenya) and the San Antonio Military Medical Center. She is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS).