From CDC to the classroom: Dr. Nickolas DeLuca joins Auburn’s Public and One Health Program
One throughline has defined Dr. Nickolas DeLuca’s career: public health doesn’t start with data or directives — it starts with people.
From neighborhood engagement in metro Birmingham, Ala., during his graduate training to nearly three decades with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), DeLuca has worked to build solutions alongside those most affected. Today, he brings that people-first approach to the classroom as a lecturer in the College of Veterinary Medicine’s Public and One Health program.
From globes to globetrotting
DeLuca stumbled upon his passion for public health while studying geography at the State University of New York Geneseo. The program went beyond maps and surveys, introducing him to the relationships between people, diseases, goods and services. Outside of class, he volunteered to teach migrant farm workers English in upstate New York once a week.
“It quickly became apparent to me how horrific their living conditions were,” DeLuca said. “That was probably the seminal moment that I decided I wanted to help.”
He continued his education as a graduate student in medical geography at San Diego State University, exploring disease patterns, health care accessibility and the cultural practices that shape how communities seek care from the U.S.-Mexico border to Santiago, Chile.
It wasn’t until a professor suggested he speak to someone in the university’s school of public health that DeLuca pieced together his interests with his future career path. Public health’s inherently multidisciplinary nature drew him in, pulling from geography, epidemiology, anthropology, medical practice, communications and more to address real-world challenges.
“You don’t grow up thinking you want to study public or One Health — you’re going to be a doctor or an engineer,” DeLuca said, “When I spoke with that professor, it was like an epiphany. I realized there was this whole other discipline.”
DeLuca’s interest in global health and disease intervention — particularly surrounding HIV/AIDS — led him to a master’s program in the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) School of Public Health. DeLuca was eager to get out of the classroom and into the field. UAB’s program gave students that opportunity by coupling coursework with U.S Peace Corps assignments.
With one master’s degree already under his belt, he was recruited into the school’s doctorate program. Instead of hopping on a plane as he anticipated, DeLuca found himself exploring ways to address health issues in underserved communities just a few blocks from campus.
He learned and practiced a concept that would become central to his career moving forward: the Community Health Advisory model. Rather than entering a community with predetermined evaluations and solutions, the model fosters trust and positive outcomes by asking the community what their top health concerns were and how they could best address them.
“I came to Birmingham thinking I had to go overseas to do that, and within months, I was in metro Birmingham having these great experiences,” DeLuca said.
Still, he couldn’t shake his passion for international health and found his next opportunity in an unlikely setting: a blueberry patch. Through casual conversation over blueberry plucking, DeLuca connected with a UAB professor, Dr. Susan Allen, who was studying the prevention of HIV transmission and the natural history of the disease in Zambia. A few months later, he was in southern Africa conducting research on the effectiveness of condom use intervention that would become his dissertation work.
Combating disease with the CDC
After finishing his doctorate, DeLuca started his first of several mini careers within the CDC as a fellow in the National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and Tuberculosis Prevention. While he had a strong interest in HIV, the fellowship primarily focused on tuberculosis. He became fascinated with the disease and its impact on marginalized and international populations.
A few years later, he pivoted to work at the CDC’s Center for Global Health as a prevention advisor for the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. The then-new program supported the ministries of health in countries with the highest HIV burden. He and his family moved to Namibia for four years where he led a team managing HIV prevention, communication and education.
DeLuca took community engagement a step further in his next role, leading the CDC’s U.S.-based communication efforts around HIV/AIDS. He developed national campaigns, including some of the first geared toward the LGBTQ+ community.
He went on to head the Center for Global Health’s communications office, broadening his scope to cover diseases across the globe. DeLuca and his team monitored potential disease outbreaks, served as the point for media inquiries and supported communications teams embedded in CDC country offices in more than 20 countries.
His final role with the CDC brought DeLuca full circle — back to the Division of Tuberculosis Elimination. He oversaw the communications, education and behavioral studies branch, working with a team to transform dense guidelines and recommendations into digestible resources for health care providers and those with and at risk for tuberculosis.
Listening when it matters the most
While in this role, DeLuca and his team were pulled in to help with response to several outbreaks in their areas of expertise: communications and contact tracing. He worked on CDC emergency responses to zika, mpox, COVID-19 and — one of his proudest efforts — the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa.
“It was a scary time,” DeLuca said. “There was a lot of misinformation about Ebola, and we were trying to control that.”
As part of one of the first teams on the ground in Sierra Leone, DeLuca and his team were tasked with improving communication surrounding the outbreak, shifting simple awareness messaging to action-based recommendations.
Using survey data and rapid community assessments with community and religious leaders, DeLuca’s team modeled its approach after the Act Against AIDS campaign he had implemented in the U.S. Through Act Against Ebola, they crafted messaging that gave communities tangible steps to reduce transmission.
The larger response team quickly realized that caregiving and traditional funeral practices were driving ongoing transmission. DeLuca and his colleagues created communication resources to promote safer care practices and safe, dignified medical burials. These messages helped explain how medical burial teams would safely prepare bodies for funerals where family and friends could observe from a safe distance.
Community input guided every step. Simple adjustments like changing the body bags from black to white to reflect local burial practices helped preserve dignity and build trust during the difficult time.
Looking back on his career with the CDC, DeLuca said the experiences that stay with him most are his years in Africa responding to Ebola and HIV.
“You can’t help but be impacted when you are in sub-Saharan Africa and you’ve seen people queuing or waiting for live-saving medical treatment,” DeLuca said. “We were literally seeing people being able to live and live longer. It made me so proud to be working in public health and proud to be part of the U.S. government doing so much good in the world.”
DeLuca also emphasized the lasting impact of mentors and colleagues who shaped his career along the way.
“I’ve been so fortunate to learn from exceptional and inspirational leaders throughout my academic training and from supportive and collaborative colleagues at the CDC and Auburn University,” he said.
Now, he hopes to carry those lessons forward by providing students in Auburn’s Public and One Health program with the same kind of guidance, encouragement and support that guided him over the years.
From public education to higher education
When he joined the Public and One Health team at Auburn in 2025, DeLuca found the transition to be a natural next step. His career had been steeped with education and training throughout, and he had experience working with education centers of excellence affiliated with academic institutions.
“What’s unique about what I can bring to the classroom is this real-world experience, connecting the academics with the realities of how it’s been applied or the challenges in applying some of these concepts on the ground,” DeLuca said.
Knowing the impact it has made on him, DeLuca puts a strong emphasis on experiential learning. In “PAOH 4910, Observing Needs in Public Health,” students volunteer at local community organizations addressing public health needs. The course underscores the multidisciplinary nature of public and one health, showing students how policy, communication, science and community engagement intersect.
With his first semester in the rearview, DeLuca finds the greatest reward in seeing students experience light bulb moments.
“I really enjoy working with the students and seeing them experience those ‘aha’ moments,” DeLuca said. “A lot of people want to help, and many assume the only path to do that is through clinical work. Public and one health opens doors to other ways of making a real, lasting impact.”
Faculty Public and One Health