# Epidemiologists

US SOC code 19-1041. Markdown version of https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/19-1041

Also called: Disease epidemiologist, Infectious disease epidemiologist, Pharmacoepidemiologist, Hospital epidemiologist, Genomic epidemiologist.

## In brief

In May 2025, [BLS](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm25nat.zip) counted **12,090** US epidemiologists, with median pay of **$87,220** a year. Of the BLS counts since 2018, the May 2025 count is the highest. The earliest figure here is [an estimate](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK221176/) of **500** from 1910, not measured the same way as today's count. The last full technology era for epidemiologists: AI-powered outbreak surveillance and genomic epidemiology platforms, 2014 to 2020. AI-assisted surveillance tools increased the reach and speed of outbreak detection without reducing epidemiology headcount.

## What the sources say

### Official outlook

BLS projects employment to grow 18.7% from 2025 to 2035. Source: [BLS Employment Projections 2025-35](https://data.bls.gov/projections/nationalMatrix?queryParams=19-1041&ioType=o).

### AI exposure studies

- **55.8%** of this job's tasks are exposed to large language models. Not a forecast of job losses. [Eloundou and others, 2023](https://github.com/openai/GPTs-are-GPTs/blob/main/data/occ_level.csv)

Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35. BLS publishes these counts as yearly survey snapshots and cautions against reading them as a precise trend. In May 2021 BLS changed how it estimates these counts (a model-based method using three years of survey data) and moved fully to the 2018 occupation codes, so part of a change across 2021 can come from the method rather than the work.

## Epidemiologists employment and pay by year

- On record since: 1850
- Latest US employment: 12,090 (May 2025). Source: BLS OEWS May 2025 [3]
- Latest US median pay: $87,220 (May 2025). Source: BLS OEWS May 2025 [6]
- Outlook: +18.7% by 2035. Source: BLS Employment Projections 2025-35 [24]

### All 26 years of cited US data

| Year | US employment | Annual pay (median unless marked) | Source |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1910 | 500 (estimate) | n/a | Est., NCBI Bookshelf [1] |
| 1951 | 1,200 (estimate) | n/a | Est., CDC Foundation [2] |
| 1990 | n/a | $38,000 (estimate) | Est., US Office of Personnel Management [5] |
| 2003 | 3,770 | $54,530 | BLS OEWS May 2003 [3] |
| 2004 | 4,560 | $54,800 | BLS OEWS May 2004 [3] |
| 2005 | 3,630 | $52,170 | BLS OEWS May 2005 [3] |
| 2006 | 4,120 | $56,670 | BLS OEWS May 2006 [3] |
| 2007 | 3,960 | $60,010 | BLS OEWS May 2007 [3] |
| 2008 | 4,370 | $61,360 | BLS OEWS May 2008 [3] |
| 2009 | 4,610 | $61,700 | BLS OEWS May 2009 [3] |
| 2010 | 4,710 | $63,010 | BLS OEWS May 2010 [3] |
| 2011 | 4,610 | $64,220 | BLS OEWS May 2011 [3] |
| 2012 | 4,850 | $65,270 | BLS OEWS May 2012 [3] |
| 2013 | 5,350 | $66,330 | BLS OEWS May 2013 [3] |
| 2014 | 5,420 | $67,420 | BLS OEWS May 2014 [3] |
| 2015 | 5,460 | $69,450 | BLS OEWS May 2015 [3] |
| 2016 | 5,690 | $70,820 | BLS OEWS May 2016 [3] |
| 2017 | 6,870 | $69,660 | BLS OEWS May 2017 [4] |
| 2018 | 7,060 | $69,660 | BLS OEWS May 2018 [3] |
| 2019 | 7,410 | $70,990 | BLS OEWS May 2019 [3] |
| 2020 | 7,500 | $74,560 | BLS OEWS May 2020 [3] |
| 2021 | 8,180 | $78,830 | BLS OEWS May 2021 [3] |
| 2022 | 9,430 | $78,520 | BLS OEWS May 2022 [3] |
| 2023 | 10,230 | $81,390 | BLS OEWS May 2023 (employment) [3]; BLS OEWS May 2023 (pay) [8] |
| 2024 | 11,460 | $83,980 | BLS OEWS May 2024 [3] |
| 2025 | 12,090 | $87,220 | BLS OEWS May 2025 [3] |

## Sources (88)

### Employment series

1. [NCBI Bookshelf -- History and Current Status of Public Health Education in the United States (Ch. 4, Who Will Keep the Public Healthy?)](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK221176/), National Academies Press / NCBI
2. [CDC Foundation -- A History of Protecting America: The Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS founding 1951)](https://www.cdcfoundation.org/blog/history-protecting-america-epidemic-intelligence-service), CDC Foundation
3. BLS OEWS, national cross-industry estimates (flat file), Bureau of Labor Statistics. Editions: [2003](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm03nat.zip), [2004](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm04nat.zip), [2005](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm05nat.zip), [2006](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm06nat.zip), [2007](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm07nat.zip), [2008](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm08nat.zip), [2009](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm09nat.zip), [2010](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm10nat.zip), [2011](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm11nat.zip), [2012](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm12nat.zip), [2013](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm13nat.zip), [2014](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm14nat.zip), [2015](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm15nat.zip), [2016](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm16nat.zip), [2018](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm18nat.zip), [2019](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm19nat.zip), [2020](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm20nat.zip), [2021](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm21nat.zip), [2022](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm22nat.zip), [2023](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm23nat.zip), [2024](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm24nat.zip), [2025](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm25nat.zip)
4. [BLS OEWS May 2017, Epidemiologists (19-1041): 6,870 employed](https://www.bls.gov/oes/2017/may/oes191041.htm), U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

### Wage series

5. [US Office of Personnel Management -- Federal Civilian Workforce Statistics: Pay Structure of the Federal Civil Service (GS pay tables, historical reference)](https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/data-analysis-documentation/federal-employment-reports/), US Office of Personnel Management
6. BLS OEWS, national cross-industry estimates (flat file), Bureau of Labor Statistics. Editions: [2003](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm03nat.zip), [2004](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm04nat.zip), [2005](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm05nat.zip), [2006](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm06nat.zip), [2007](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm07nat.zip), [2008](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm08nat.zip), [2009](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm09nat.zip), [2010](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm10nat.zip), [2011](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm11nat.zip), [2012](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm12nat.zip), [2013](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm13nat.zip), [2014](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm14nat.zip), [2015](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm15nat.zip), [2016](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm16nat.zip), [2018](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm18nat.zip), [2019](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm19nat.zip), [2020](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm20nat.zip), [2021](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm21nat.zip), [2022](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm22nat.zip), [2025](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm25nat.zip)
7. [BLS OEWS May 2017, Epidemiologists (19-1041): median annual wage $69,660](https://www.bls.gov/oes/2017/may/oes191041.htm), U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
8. [BLS OOH -- Epidemiologists (2024-25 edition: median annual wage $81,390 in May 2023)](https://www.bls.gov/ooh/life-physical-and-social-science/epidemiologists.htm), Bureau of Labor Statistics
9. [BLS OEWS May 2024, national cross-industry estimates (flat file)](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm24nat.zip), U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

### Tool eras

10. [PMC -- John Snow, Cholera, the Broad Street Pump; Waterborne Diseases Then and Now (PMC7150208)](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7150208/), PMC / National Library of Medicine
11. [UCLA Epidemiology -- John Snow and the 1854 Broad Street Cholera Outbreak (historical site)](https://epi-snow.ph.ucla.edu/), UCLA Department of Epidemiology
12. [NCBI Bookshelf -- History and Current Status of Public Health Education in the United States (history of vital statistics and early public health infrastructure)](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK221176/), National Academies Press / NCBI
13. [Britannica -- William Farr (national vital statistics system, 1839 onward)](https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Farr), Encyclopaedia Britannica
14. [CDC MMWR -- Evolution of Epidemic Investigations and Field Epidemiology during the MMWR Era at CDC, 1961-2011](https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/su6004a5.htm), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
15. [CDC Foundation -- A History of Protecting America: The Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS program context)](https://www.cdcfoundation.org/blog/history-protecting-america-epidemic-intelligence-service), CDC Foundation
16. [O\*NET 19-1041.00 -- Epidemiologists: technology skills include R, Python, SAS, Stata, REDCap, ArcGIS](https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/19-1041.00), O\*NET / BLS
17. [Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health -- Centennial of the Department of Epidemiology (AJE 2019): modern epidemiology methods history](https://academic.oup.com/aje/article/188/12/2043/5567558), American Journal of Epidemiology / Oxford Academic
18. [BlueDot.global -- AI-powered infectious disease intelligence; detected COVID-19 nine days before WHO PHEIC; 100+ pathogens across 65 languages](https://bluedot.global/), BlueDot
19. [Nextstrain.org -- real-time pathogen genomic surveillance; SARS-CoV-2 variant tracking; influenza H5N1; maintained by Fred Hutchinson / NIH](https://nextstrain.org/), Nextstrain / Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center
20. [WHO EIOS -- Epidemic Intelligence from Open Sources: AI-assisted NLP epidemic threat detection; 40+ national public health authorities; IHR-integrated](https://www.who.int/initiatives/eios), World Health Organization
21. [Abbott et al. (2020) Wellcome Open Research -- EpiNow2: Bayesian Rt estimation and nowcasting pipeline; standard tool for COVID-19 and ongoing respiratory surveillance](https://wellcomeopenresearch.org/articles/5-112), Wellcome Open Research
22. [Elicit.com -- AI research assistant; 200M+ papers; PICO extraction from RCT abstracts; systematic review triage acceleration](https://elicit.com/), Elicit
23. [Eloundou et al. 2024 -- GPTs are GPTs (Science): occupational LLM exposure framework; epidemiologists in high-exposure band for writing and literature synthesis](https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.10130), OpenAI / Science

### Forecasts and exposure studies

24. [BLS Employment Projections 2025-35, National Employment Matrix: 19-1041 Epidemiologists (2025: 12.8 thousand; 2035: 15.2 thousand; +18.7%)](https://data.bls.gov/projections/nationalMatrix?queryParams=19-1041&ioType=o), Bureau of Labor Statistics
25. [Eloundou, Manning, Mishkin & Rock (2023), "GPTs are GPTs", occupation-level exposure data occ\_level.csv (O\*NET-SOC 19-1041.00, human-rated β 0.558)](https://github.com/openai/GPTs-are-GPTs/blob/main/data/occ_level.csv), OpenAI

### Historical notes

26. [Scholarly Societies Project -- 1850 London Epidemiological Society founding (May 6, 1850, Hanover Square)](https://www.scholarly-societies.org/history/1850les.html), University of Waterloo Scholarly Societies Project
27. [PMC -- John Snow, Cholera, the Broad Street Pump; Waterborne Diseases Then and Now (PMC7150208)](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7150208/), PMC / National Library of Medicine
28. [Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health -- History timeline: 1916 Rockefeller Foundation grant, Department of Epidemiology founding](https://publichealth.jhu.edu/about/history/timeline), Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
29. [CDC Foundation -- A History of Protecting America: The Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS founding 1951, 4,100+ graduates)](https://www.cdcfoundation.org/blog/history-protecting-america-epidemic-intelligence-service), CDC Foundation
30. [CDC MMWR -- Pneumocystis Pneumonia, Los Angeles (June 5, 1981): first published description of AIDS cases](https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/june_5.htm), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
31. [CDC Emerging Infectious Diseases -- Public Health Interventions and SARS Spread, 2003 (Vol. 10, No. 11)](https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/10/11/04-0729_article), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
32. [CDC MMWR -- Assessment of Epidemiology Capacity in State Health Departments, United States, 2021 (23% growth in positions 2017-2021)](https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7113a2.htm), CSTE / CDC MMWR

### Predecessors & successors

33. [CDC Foundation -- History of the Epidemic Intelligence Service (origin of applied epidemiology from physician-investigators)](https://www.cdcfoundation.org/blog/history-protecting-america-epidemic-intelligence-service), CDC Foundation
34. [Britannica -- William Farr: vital statistics pioneer whose analytical work defined the quantitative spine of epidemiology](https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Farr), Encyclopaedia Britannica

### Present-day analysis

- [O\*NET 30.3 — Epidemiologists (19-1041.00): tasks, work activities, technology skills, employment data](https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/19-1041.00), accessed 2026-05-24
- [BLS OOH — Epidemiologists: ~9,100 employed 2024; +6% growth 2024-2034; median $81,390; 600 annual openings; 55% state/local government](https://www.bls.gov/ooh/life-physical-and-social-science/epidemiologists.htm), accessed 2026-05-24
- [BlueDot.global (2025) — AI-powered infectious disease intelligence; detected COVID-19 nine days before WHO PHEIC; 100+ pathogens monitored; NLP across 65 languages](https://bluedot.global/), accessed 2026-05-24
- [HealthMap (Boston Children's Hospital / Harvard) — automated outbreak surveillance; detected COVID-19 Dec 30 2019; 150,000+ reports/day across 15 languages; Nature 2020 retrospective](http://www.healthmap.org/en/), accessed 2026-05-24
- [WHO EIOS (2025) — Epidemic Intelligence from Open Sources: AI-assisted NLP for global epidemic threat detection; operational in 40+ countries; integrated with IHR alert workflows](https://www.who.int/initiatives/eios), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Nextstrain.org (2025) — real-time pathogen genomic surveillance; phylogenetic tracking of SARS-CoV-2, influenza H5N1, mpox; Fred Hutchinson / NIH consortium; Cell 2021 SARS-CoV-2 genomic epi landmark](https://nextstrain.org/), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Rambaut et al. (2020) Nature Microbiology — Pangolin: ML-based SARS-CoV-2 lineage assignment; \>15M genomes processed via GISAID integration; WHO standard for lineage classification](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41564-020-0770-5?error=cookies_not_supported&code=f0cfec87-8cbb-4556-a65d-84537a573848), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Abbott et al. (2020) Wellcome Open Research — EpiNow2: Bayesian Rt estimation and nowcasting pipeline; standard tool for COVID-19 and ongoing respiratory disease surveillance](https://wellcomeopenresearch.org/articles/5-112), accessed 2026-05-24
- [CDC BioSense Platform / NSSP (2025) — national syndromic surveillance; ML anomaly detection in ESSENCE across 6,000+ emergency departments; MMWR Surveillance Summary 2024](https://www.cdc.gov/nssp/php/about/index.html), accessed 2026-05-24
- [CSTE 2023 Annual Epidemiology Capacity Assessment — 1 in 4 epidemiology positions nationally unfilled; state and local health department workforce shortage persists post-COVID](https://www.cste.org/general/custom.asp?page=EpidemiologyCapacityAssessment), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Eloundou et al. 2024 — GPTs are GPTs (Science): occupational LLM exposure framework; epidemiologists in high-exposure band for writing and literature synthesis tasks](https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.10130), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Lee et al. (2020) Bioinformatics — BioBERT: biomedical NLP pre-training for named entity recognition and relation extraction from scientific literature](https://academic.oup.com/bioinformatics/article/36/4/1234/5566506), accessed 2026-05-24
- [GISAID Initiative (2025) — global pathogen genomic data sharing; Nextstrain and Pangolin pipelines integrated for real-time lineage assignment](https://gisaid.org/), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Elicit.com (2025) — AI research assistant; 200M+ papers; PICO extraction from RCT abstracts; Cochrane-style systematic review triage acceleration](https://elicit.com/), accessed 2026-05-24

How to read these figures: https://futurehistory.earth/methodology. Every figure links to its own source; gaps stay gaps.