John S Meschke, Ph.D.

405/271-2070 Ext. 46761

John-Meschke@ou.edu

John “Scott” Meschke is the incoming Chair of the Department of Occupational and Environmental Health in the Hudson School of Public Health at Oklahoma University Health Sciences Center.  Dr. Meschke is joining OUHSC from the University of Washington in Seattle, where he was a Professor and Associate Chair in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences in the School of Public Health.  He additionally held an adjunct appointment in Civil and Environmental Engineering in College of Engineering at UW. Dr. Meschke served at the University of Washington since 2002.

Dr. Meschke completed his PhD and Postdoctoral training in Environmental Sciences and Engineering in the School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.  Prior to that Dr. Meschke completed a Master of Science in Environmental Science from the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University.  Dr. Meschke completed his undergraduate training (B.A. Biology) and law degree (J.D.) from the University of Kansas in Lawrence.

Dr. Meschke has more than 25 years of experience as an environmental and occupational health microbiologist, specializing in the fate, transport, detection, and control of pathogens in environmental media (Air, Water, Food, and Surfaces). Dr. Meschke’s research interests include: environmental surveillance for infectious agents, development of methods for sampling and detection of viruses and bacteria in water and food, market prevalence of foodborne pathogens, recovery of bacterial and viruses from surfaces, irrigation and produce wash water quality, quantitative microbial risk assessment (QMRA) and policy implications of infectious agents.  Over the last 10+ years he has worked to develop, validate and field test methods for environmental surveillance (e.g. wastewater-based epidemiology, WBE) of poliovirus, Salmonella Typhi, SARS-CoV-2 and other pathogens.  His research group has worked in close collaboration with the WHO and CDC polio teams, as well as colleagues in Kenya, South Africa, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, and other locations.

Additionally, Dr. Meschke has served on several advisory groups including: the recently disbanded NORA Cross Sector Council on Infectious, Immune and Dermal Diseases; WHO Guidelines Development Group for Wastewater Surveillance; NASEM Committee on Community Wastewater-based Infectious Disease Surveillance; NIST Standards for Wastewater Surveillance working group; ASTHO Ethical National Wastewater Surveillance - Infectious Diseases Workgroup; WHO Expert review group for the development of Guidance on prioritization and implementation of multi-pathogen wastewater and environmental surveillance (WES) to support public health decision-making; and WHO Preferred Pathway Characteristics (PPC) development group dedicated to advancing tools for multi-pathogen WES.

Additionally, Dr. Meschke actively participates in several professional organizations.  He is a former board member and current vice Chair of the Health-Related Microbiology specialist group of the International Water Association.  He has served as treasurer for the International Society for Food and Environmental Virology, and is a long-term member of the American Society for Microbiology, American Water Works Association, and International Association of Food Protection. 

Dr. Meschke is married to Lea Anne Meschke (a school psychologist) and has two sons, Flynn and Beck, the youngest of which is a senior at Cal-Poly in San Luis Obispo.  Dr. Meschke is an avid soccer and music fan, and loves to cook.